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Before their first time, they argue over who gets to lead.
‘Look,’ Serena says (reasonably, she thinks), ‘I’m the one who’s new to it all, aren’t I? I need all the practice I can get, so you should let me go first.’
Bernie just smirks at her, unconvinced. ‘Good try, Ms Campbell, but I somehow doubt that you need any practice with … any of this sort of thing, previous heterosexuality notwithstanding.’
They’ve not even made it to bed yet; that’s the most ridiculous thing. They’re still in the living room, sitting pressed into one another on the sofa, legs entwined. Wine glasses in hand, Serena thinks in mild hysteria, because Bernie had insisted they talk about it. Had insisted that she make sure Serena was comfortable. (Serena had wanted to tell her that the only discomfort she was feeling was the fault of being forced to talk about what she wanted to do instead of do it. She hadn’t; had figured she probably shouldn’t spurn Bernie’s awkward but well-intentioned efforts at communication. She’s regretting that a little bit now.)
‘Well,’ she says, ‘that’s all very flattering and chivalrous of you, darling, but you really needn’t worry.’ Serena pats her on the knee, and when Bernie immediately catches her hand and squeezes, the soft, shy smile that comes with it makes Serena’s heart flip in her chest. She’s almost come to terms with the daily shock of Bernie’s beauty, by now, but her sweetness still takes her by surprise. She squeezes back and says, ‘It’s fine, all right? I want this. I want to go first.’ She smoulders at her. ‘Really.’
Bernie swallows visibly and murmurs, ‘I just think you deserve to be … to be pampered, that’s all.’ She swirls the remainder of her wine around in her glass, looking into it, her cheeks pinking high at the bone. ‘And you should … you should let me. Pamper you, I mean.’
Serena feels that sentiment, most welcome, stir low in her stomach; resists the urge to shower Bernie with declarations of love in response, or just drag her up to the bedroom and express herself that way, and smiles instead. ‘That’s very sweet of you.’
Bernie smiles back, that half-relieved, half-satisfied one she smiles when she thinks she’s done something right in the relationship department. This whole time, she’s been the very definition of thoughtful, of chivalrous, of … gentlemanly, really. That’s the word Serena’s mother would have used. They go out to dinner and Bernie kisses her on her doorstep afterwards, all passion and ferocity, lips and tongues and hot hot hands at the dip of her waist that leave her reeling, every time, and then Bernie ducks her head and says, ‘Goodnight, then.’
They go to Albie’s after work and sit in the armchairs in their favourite corner, a coffee table between them, undressing one another with their eyes. Serena rises, thighs tingling, heart racing, and heads to the bathroom; waits about twenty-five seconds before Bernie follows her and backs her into the nearest (cleanest) wall, kissing her like her life depends on it, straying down to her lips and her jaw and her neck. When Serena gasps, ‘Take me home,’ (or maybe just, ‘Take me,’ depending on the shift they’ve had, on how much wine they’ve scoffed, on what Bernie’s wearing), Bernie always kisses her again – softer, then – and backs away with a smile.
‘Soon,’ she whispers, and gives Serena a look that makes her throb.
They’re only sitting here now, having this conversation, because Serena had eventually started to worry. She’d not been able to help it, really, not after the toast to keep it confined to theatre (Bernie’s idea), nor after the running away to Kiev when Serena had moved too fast (and again), and though giving things between them a go had been Bernie’s idea, as well, Serena had started to wonder if Bernie had maybe been having second thoughts after all. So she’d asked about it, clarified efficiently through pleasurable means that Bernie did still want her, want this, and Bernie’s passionate negative response to the suggestion of anything else – that she might not be ready, that she might not be as attracted to Serena as she’d thought – had convinced Serena of the truth of it right away. (She can feel that she’ll have a hickey by tomorrow, actually, but she thinks that the line of her blouse should hide it.)
A moment ago they’d sat up, straightened their clothing, and Bernie had apologised. Unnecessarily; as far as Serena’s concerned, she ought only to have apologised for stopping. Serena had fetched a bottle and now here they are, decidedly not naked, because Bernie had said, ‘I think we should have a chat.’
Serena’s mission this evening is to make it clear to Bernie that she, at least, doesn’t want to go slow. That she will only continue to do so if and when she establishes that that is what Bernie wants. It’s been two weeks since their kiss in the office, since Bernie’s return: nervous but brave, frightened but changed, newly-dyed and fully willing to commit. She’d wondered at first if Bernie had just needed time to adjust, if she’d feared how it would look if she ripped Serena’s clothes off two minutes after their reunion. But now, where she can see her own desire so ardently reflected in Bernie’s blown pupils and quickened breath, where she can feel in Bernie’s eager touch that waiting is killing her, too, she’s had enough. She’s tired of politeness. She’s tired of chivalry (well, apart from when Bernie appears behind her to help her into her coat; that she likes). But most of all, she’s tired of seeing this brilliant, passionate woman being a gentleman when she just wants her to be herself. She’s never been much a fan of delayed gratification.
‘I just don’t want to rush things,’ Bernie says, now. ‘You know?’ She sets their glasses aside and returns to her spot on the sofa, to their interlinked fingers, stroking Serena’s up and down. ‘We’ve waited so long and I made such a frightful mess of everything that I … I just want it to be perfect. The next step. Everything.’
‘Bernie, darling,’ Serena murmurs, brushing back a stray lock of hair. ‘That’s a lovely thought, but you know it doesn’t work like that. It’s either never perfect or it’s always perfect because the person is right and the imperfections don’t matter.’
Bernie looks up at her through her lashes. ‘But aren’t you … don’t you feel a bit … there’s so much at stake,’ she finishes finally, and Serena nods, shrugs.
‘I know there is. But I also know that it’s worth it, that you’re worth it. This. Us.’ She takes a deep breath, studies the tiny muscles moving in Bernie’s jaw, and says, softly, ‘It’s okay if you’re nervous, Bernie. I’m … I’m nervous too. Nothing to be ashamed of.’
She knows she’s hit the spot when Bernie’s fingers tighten minutely around hers, when she doesn’t look up. ‘Bernie?’
Finally, she sighs and says, ‘I just … I ought to be the one who knows the rules. The ‘experienced’ one. I ought to be able to show you … to help you …’ she trails off, frustrated, and only then meets Serena’s eyes. ‘Do you have any idea what I’m getting at?’
Serena chuckles and nods. ‘I do, and you know what I’m going to say?’
Bernie shakes her head.
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘What?’
‘It doesn’t matter that you don’t feel like some … lesbian sex goddess, or what have you, because I’m not expecting you to be.’
Bernie snorts out a laugh and Serena grins, shifts closer.
‘In case you didn’t notice, it’s you I want, Bernie, and I know your history. I know you weren’t living it up in gay bars before you met Alex; I know you spent most of your adult life married to a man. As did I.’ She slides her fingers out of Bernie’s to run them up the inside of her wrist, curling her nails, and smiles when she feels the hitch in Bernie’s breath. ‘But at the risk of speaking in clichés,’ she says, and pitches her voice low just to watch Bernie squirm and lean closer, ‘I’m sure that anything we lack in … practical knowledge we’ll more than make up for in enthusiasm. Don’t you?’
Bernie swallows again, nods tightly. ‘If … if you’re certain that’s what you want, then—’
‘Oh, it is,’ Serena says, and right there, right then, makes a decision. Lets go of Bernie’s hand and stands before her, moves her own hands to her blouse and starts to slowly, slowly undo the top button. ‘What,’ she says, ‘am I going,’ – she moves down the row, one at a time, sliding each button open with painful slowness, eyes never wavering – ‘to have to do,’ – she opens the last one and slides the blouse off her shoulders, doesn’t take her eyes off Bernie even as it falls to the floor – ‘to convince you?’
Bernie is sitting there, mouth half-open, eyes as dark as Serena has ever seen, as dark as she ever knew eyes could be, and says, ‘Uh. I…’
Serena smirks, slides her fingers down her now-exposed camisole, over her breasts and stomach, lingering at each, and crosses them into the fabric at her waist. ‘Hmm?’ she says.
‘God, Serena,’ Bernie manages, and she’s still sitting there, the clown, apparently immobilised by arousal.
‘I usually prefer “goddess,”’ Serena purrs, drawing the camisole slowly, slowly up over her head and tossing it off, ‘but I do approve of the sentiment.’ She doesn’t know where the thing lands and doesn’t care. She smirks again, licks her lips, and it’s that that finally propels Bernie into action: she lets out an actual growl – a hungry, feral sound – and launches herself at Serena, kissing her fiercely, hands roaming wild. The litany of expletives that leave her mouth as she does so are quite impressive, even for an ex-army woman.
‘Why, I never,’ Serena says gleefully, as she’s manoeuvred up the stairs in the general direction of her bedroom (minus one or two detours; Bernie isn’t paying a lot of attention to where they’re headed, and they almost end up in the study by mistake). ‘I’d never have thought the chivalrous, caring, gentlemanlike Ms Wolfe would be quite so—oh, how lovely.’ This as Bernie nips at her neck – punishment, perhaps, though encouragement is just as likely – so Serena keeps talking, even as Bernie pushes her up against the door to the bedroom and starts to kiss down her chest, leaving cool, wet trails along the valley between her breasts, pressing open-mouthed kisses to the swell of them, still wrapped in satin, murmuring delightful obscenities into her skin.
She grips into Bernie’s hair and tugs experimentally; is rewarded by Bernie’s gasp, by the sucking kiss she presses into the sensitive skin above Serena’s navel. ‘Oh,’ she breathes, and, ‘Bernie, yes, can—’
Fortunately, Bernie interprets this as the request it was meant to be, and slides up Serena’s body, presses into her and kisses her heatedly, wetly, as she leans across to open the door. They stumble inside together, neither bothering with the lights; the curtains are open, and there is just enough light from the streetlamp and the moon combined to allow them to see one another. Serena is glad; her first glimpse of Bernie’s body in something other than scrubs or jeans – in nothing at all, she hopes – and she doesn’t want to waste it.
Bernie, it seems, is in a similar predicament; she doesn’t stop running her hands all up and down Serena’s skin, touching and grasping and stroking and squeezing everywhere she can reach. She is speaking; she can’t stop speaking, and Serena isn’t even sure she know she’s doing it. ‘You have no idea how many times I’ve thought about this, Serena,’ she murmurs, hands cupping her breasts through her bra, sliding down to her hips and back up again as she kisses her, again and again, desperate and gloriously uncontrolled. ‘How often I’ve dreamt of it, how often I’ve … God, how you’ve distracted me, every day, and I … oh, it was all I could do not to drag you into a corner and have my way with you.’
‘Really?’ Serena asks coyly, as she finally gets the chance to slip Bernie’s cardigan off her shoulders, to work on the pesky set of buttons underneath. She gets them off, gets the shirt off, and then they are standing at the foot of the bed, kissing furiously in trousers and bras and socks. She pulls away to grin and say, ‘Because I could’ve sworn you were trying to take things slow.’
To her delight, Bernie grins back at her, shakes her head. ‘What a fool I was,’ she says. She lifts a trembling hand and presses it to Serena’s cheek; Serena turns to kiss it, finds the skin hot. ‘Can you ever forgive me?’
‘For your misguided chivalry? Yes. If you don’t take my clothes off and ravish me right now? Possibly not.’
Bernie just barks out a laugh and says, ‘I think that can be arranged.’
Getting undressed is an astonishingly quick and efficient process, really, when two dextrous people put their minds to it. There’s a moment of difficulty when Serena’s stockings seem to have adhered to her skin – ‘I haven’t shaved my legs in a week,’ she laughs, ‘I think it’s sticking,’ – and then again when Bernie’s bra strap gets caught in her own messed-up hair (though Serena’s to blame for that). But then they’re naked, they’re finally naked, and God, Serena has never relished the glorious feeling of skin on skin as much as she does in this moment. It’s so good already, she thinks, it might almost eclipse what’s to come.
That is almost immediately proven an exaggeration, because something even more fiery and unrestrained activates in Bernie the moment their bodies slide together, and Bernie laughs, freer and more abandoned than Serena has ever heard her, and tangles their legs to roll them into the centre of the bed. The whole thing leaves Serena a little breathless; she would ordinarily feel a bit embarrassed by going weak-boned at a simple display of Bernie’s strength, but it isn’t the strength that’s done it; it’s Bernie’s expression, an open, joyous thing, and the way she isn’t shuttering herself. They could stop right now, Serena thinks, could go no further than lying together like this, and she would already feel that they had reached a precious level of intimacy.
Bernie smiles down at her, elbows braced on either side of her shoulders, and murmurs, ‘Is this okay?’
Serena smiles back. ‘More than okay.’
‘We can stop at any time, you know, if it gets too much? If you feel overwhelmed, or, or—’
‘Oh, Bernie,’ Serena laughs, ‘I think it’s rather the point to feel overwhelmed, don’t you?’
Bernie kisses her, nips at her lip, licks it better. ‘Not what I meant and you know it.’
‘Yes, I do. And thank you,’ she adds, because she senses that this entire exchange is more significant to Bernie than it appears. ‘The same goes for you,’ she murmurs. ‘No matter when, no matter why, if you feel uncomfortable, say so. All right? We can stop and play backgammon instead.’
Bernie honks out a laugh and says, ‘Naked?’
‘Why not? Naked backgammon. Plan B.’
She presses her breasts up, rubs them against Bernie’s own and grins at the feeling. She’s been wondering for weeks how that would feel; nipples on nipples, soft flesh on soft flesh. Now she knows. ‘Let’s start with Plan A, though, shall we?’ she asks, breathless again when Bernie leans down and sucks her earlobe into her mouth, gentle at first and then harder when Serena moans her encouragement.
‘Yes,’ Bernie murmurs, and grins at her. ‘Let’s.’
*
In the end, Bernie sort of goes first, but only because she figures out so early on that using a single hand to pin Serena’s arms above her head is something Serena really, really likes. Bernie grins at her rakishly and kisses her, messily, deeply, and then pulls away with a sudden pop to move her mouth down her body, lavishing attention along her neck and clavicles before settling when she gets to her breasts. She starts soft, almost hesitant for all her enthusiasm, and licks all around the nipple before she finally sucks it into her mouth. This isn’t a first-time sensation, but oh, it almost feels it, because Serena is hyperaware of every other point at which they are touching: her own foot moving unthinkingly up and down Bernie’s calf; Bernie’s thigh warm and slick between her legs; the rasping, delicious, foreign feeling of damp curls against her own thigh.
She gasps and whines and writhes and she delights in it, every moment. She’s never felt it before, this niggling desperation to … to … she isn’t even sure; she just wants, madly, tangentially, every touch and sensation and emotion all at once because this is Bernie, and this is already so much more than just sex. This is where they belong, where they’ve been headed since that very first day, that very first moment of lit-up eyes and smiles.
Every part of her body is throbbing, she’s half-wild with desire, so she thrusts hard against Bernie’s hips to get her attention and says, ‘Come up here.’
Bernie does; releases her hands and slides up her body, delicious slick friction and heat, and moves to kiss her. There is a light sheen of sweat forming across Bernie’s chest, across her stomach and forehead, and Serena rubs herself into it, revels in the raw, pure, animal heat of it all. God, she loves sex.
Bernie’s laughter is what makes Serena realise that she’s said it out loud, but she doesn’t care; she could never feel shame for either the thought or the words. Bernie kisses her, pulls back a little and says against her lips, almost a whisper, ‘I love it, too, Serena. With you.’
They kiss and they slide together; they kiss until they have moved so close that there is no space between them, no air. Bernie’s thigh has manoeuvred itself into an especially satisfying position and Serena gasps, grinds her hips against it; does it again when it only inflames her pleasure. Bernie shifts, wriggling around and rearranging her gangly limbs until they’ve found an angle that works for both of them, and then they move; they don’t even plan it, it just happens. What else could they do but move?
It takes a little while to find a rhythm – Bernie is nervous, still, and Serena is so turned on she can barely think – but then they do, and from there it’s easy; from there it’s coming together and releasing, kissing as long and hard as they can, kissing until the need for breath overwhelms and they breathe instead into each other’s necks and hair, pressing sloppy, badly-aimed kisses wherever their lips can reach, huffing out breaths of laughter as the tension builds higher, as they bring each other ever-nearer the edge. In the end, it takes a bit longer for Bernie to get there; Serena has to hold on, has to clench her muscles, has to ignore the heady scent of their sex combined and the intoxicating feel of Bernie’s breasts, her slickness, her everything, but then it happens and they fall, more or less together, Serena’s laughter infecting Bernie, too.
They’re nothing more than a sweaty, exhausted pile of limbs for some minutes afterwards; it’s possible Serena falls into a microsleep, or maybe she’s just drifting on bliss. Bernie is lying against her, head of matted hair on her shoulder, arm tucked across her hips, legs still knotted together like pretzels. They’ve pushed the sheets back (probably for the best, Serena thinks with a smirk) and are lying there, exposed to the open air and the moonlight, their skin cooling and their heartrates slowing.
‘So,’ Serena murmurs, when she’s recharged energy enough to form words, ‘what do you say, then?’
‘Hmm?’ Bernie asks, dreamy.
Serena strokes her shoulder, caresses her breast, moves back up again. ‘Round one,’ she says. ‘I’d say we didn’t do too badly, for amateurs.’
Bernie makes an effort to move, now, lifting her head from Serena’s shoulder to smile down at her with warm, dark eyes. She kisses her, lazily, and says, ‘I’d say we did all right, too.’ She bites her lip. ‘That being said…’
Serena arches an eyebrow.
‘We wouldn’t want to get complacent, would we? Wouldn’t want to risk that a good first effort might make us, ah, arrogant or anything…’
Serena grins, sighs in pleasure as Bernie’s fingers find her still-sensitive nipple, roll it gently. ‘I think I see what you’re getting at,’ she says. ‘You’re suggesting we … keep on top of our skills, hmm?’
‘Exactly. I’d recommend army-style precision, in fact; a thorough,’ – she leans down to lick at the breast she’s been thumbing – ‘thorough regimen of training. Every day, if possible.’ She laughs as she says it, and Serena has to laugh, too; they both know that it’s a practical impossibility – taking into account their unique cocktail of hospital schedules, middle-aged hormones, and Jason – deliciously tempting though it is.
‘I think you’re right,’ Serena says. She slides her fingers down Bernie’s body and dares to tangle them into her curls; feels a renewed flush of heat at the way Bernie moans and cants her hips. ‘Best start now then, hadn’t we? I still have a few … untested skills I’d like to master.’
Bernie, it would seem, does not object.