GENRE: Lesbian Romance
LENGTH: 26,111 words
RATING:

Once a beautiful sunflower pageant queen, Jenny Parks now suffers from Alzheimer’s in her early fifties. She gardens and reads, but struggles with the piano. Some days are good. More days are bad.

Of course, her three adult children are of no help regarding her condition. Her oldest son Keaton is retired from professional football and spends all his time being immature. He carelessly spends his hard-earned money and has a playful time with his friends. Then there’s Steven, Jenny’s middle son, who chooses to live in a bizarre cult in Idaho and wears a black bonnet. And Jenny’s youngest son, Benson ... well, she hasn’t seen him in decades, and for good reason.

Thank goodness she has her best friend and lover, Cara Dixon, to care for her. Sweet, charming, and vampire/mystery writer Cara. What would Jenny do without her? Cara is her life, soul, and mind. She’s Jenny’s lifeline these days, and her heart.

When Jenny requests a short visit to her family’s cabin north of Pittsburgh, Cara agrees to take her. There some of Jenny’s memories return, but emotional breakdowns occur, and Miss Sunflower might just lose her crown -- and mind -- for good. Can Cara help now?

EXCERPT:
Note: may contain sexually explicit scenes of a homoerotic nature.

We break a cardinal rule of the lake and drink too much white wine this first night together along Lake Corgi. The night is pristine. Nothing I imagine it will be. Blue-silver with splotches of pre-midnight black. A sliver of smiling moon somewhat hides behind stray clouds. The August temperature is mild with a bit of stick in the air, but nothing contemptuous. The occasional firefly dances around us, teasing our twosome.

She dares me to climb inside the flat-bottomed boat and take a row with her around the island. “Something short, Cara. A carefree tour of the night. Just the two of us.”

“I wouldn’t dare, Jenny. It’s nighttime. We’ll fall into the lake and drown.” I realize the weight of my statement. The ridiculousness and disrespect. As soon as I mention falling into the lake and drowning, I want to immediately take it back. It’s bad karma or sin speaking.

“How much do you like me?”

More than my previous girlfriends. Alicia Dials, a boxer. Nancy Pelican, a high school gym teacher. Catherine Sommer, the art director of a local ad agency. These are all relationships that have ended badly. Failures in my life Affairs that I have left and learned from. “That’s not fair. It’s dangerously dark out and ...”

“Benson will protect us,” she whispers, collects me in her wilting arms, pulls my face to hers with her warm palms, and kisses me. It’s not the first kiss we share, but it’s the first time my heart opens for her and I melt. Something occurs between us that I’m not supposed to understand: a feminine, chemical overspill that should be considered dangerous and toxic and forbidden for humans to inhale. Noxiously enchanting.

On the lake. Around and around. The night observing our remarkable tryst. During our kissing, the island feels as if it opens and lava spills out and catches everything on fire. Jenny and I become its unstoppable fuel and energy source; our bodies and longing for each other cause its fiery heat and tender rage to bring the lake to a raging boil. The island’s melodramatic enthusiasm and bliss reveal its feminine warmth and build within, coming to life: beating beneath our feet, cooking, unable to stay tapped.

When the kissing ends, I tell her, “You’re very convincing.”

“So I’ve been told.”

And we continue to kiss, burning the island to the ground. Burning. Fire and heat mix. An eruption occurs between us that feels mutually volcanic. Burning. It. All. To. The. Ground.

Minutes later, we climb into the wobbly boat, and she pushes us into the lake by using one of the oars. Crickets create an African string of lullabies, and bullfrogs become backup bass. Fireflies know when they are needed as they flash on and off, hard at labor, filling the evening with a romantic sparkle that will stay imprinted within the folds of my mind for decades to come. In the distance, somewhere along the lake, I presume on the eastern side, hidden among the pines and thick oaks, an owl wants to be noticed and hoots once, twice, and three times.

We float along the lake’s calm surface -- creations in a Disney movie. The first female in love with a female cartoon that will blow up the hardcore Christians, Bible Thumpers, and Republicans of the nation. Our knees touch as she faces me, and a soft and mellow giggle escapes her shadowed lips. She looks pristine in the night’s glowing, silver-white moonlight, a docile and entrancing ray herself with soft and shiny shoulders, hard nipples through her slip-like dress that matches the moon, a smooth-looking stomach under the thin cotton, and recumbent legs ever so slightly crossed at their petite ankles.

I can’t think of a better time or place to fall in love with her. Never. Here and now feel suitable. The way the night speaks of fulfilling wishes and the moonlight promises things that we might just find reachable. The wind becomes soft and smooth, like her spine and the nape of her back. The mollifying and delicate waves on the lake turn into melancholy enjoyment, whispers, or sirens that caress the boat’s port and starboard.

“Your eyes,” she says, “are sparkling more than the stars tonight.”

“Stop. That’s the worst cliché I’ve ever heard.”

“But it’s true. They are.” She reaches through the glossed and fairytale space between us and gently brushes fingertips against one of my bare shins. “I only tell the truth. You know this.”

Heat rushes through my chest, temples, and between my thighs. I don’t know how it happens, but the boat rocks to the left and right, left and right. I steady it with the oar, dragging its rounded spoon through the water.

Knowing her accomplished damage, she giggles, which echoes across the lake’s sprawling and unseen surface. “Careful now, Cara.”

The boat steadies, but my heart doesn’t; it will never steady. “You’re very bad.”

“Only with those that I like.”

“We could have drowned.”

“I would have saved you. I’m quite the swimmer. Didn’t I tell you I’ve won my share of ribbons in college?”

I’m unaware of her many talents, but I learn a few this evening: how she executes instructions and tells me to row the boat back to the island and dock; how she says we need a strong drink before turning in for the night; how she walks me into the single bedroom and peals the few clothes off my body; how she drags her tongue from my earlobes down to my breasts; how she uses an ice cube from the freezer around my navel and ... elsewhere; how she holds and creases me against her, following our passionate moment of mixed perspiration and continuous huffing; and how she whispers against my ear, “You make me feel like Miss Sunflower again. So young and beautiful.”