(four)
Jessica Barnes only wish was for there to be lights, hundreds and hundreds of lights.
And so it was done.
Blue and white only - no red and green to make it seem like a Christmas event, winding around the banisters and the down the walls and in the two trees by the edge of the drive - points of illumination that tried to out-do the stars.
And Jessica Barnes believes that they have, standing back and arms crossed as the cars roll in and there is a brief moment where each pair of eyes freezes.
They all stand still and take it in, like some kind of magical wonderland, sugar plum fairies and such dancing in their heads.
And Jessica Barnes did it all.
Well, with some help from that one issue of Martha Stewart Living as well.
Then everyone is in motion again, back to drinking and fucking and getting high.
And the usual boys flirt with Jessica Barnes. And the usual girls try to befriend Jessica Barnes.
And Jessica Barnes grins happily to herself over another successful year.
\
They walk in together this time, on the eleventh of December, holding hands with ease.
As if they have known each other for lifetimes upon lifetimes.
And maybe they have.
Ashley doesn't believe in God, but maybe reincarnation does occur.
Spencer doesn't know what happens when you die, but maybe the soul does go on.
Maybe they were always meant to meet and fall in love.
Because that is what has happened, quick as lightning, the two of them going from undeniable attraction to simple emotion.
Simply put, they like each other. Simply put, they are falling for each other.
Like blinking. Like breathing.
"You want something to drink?" Ashley whispers into Spencer's ear and feels the blonde girl shiver at that barely-there contact and it creates a now familiar swirl of heat in her own stomach.
Ashley has named it 'want'. Constant want. Constant desire.
She'd call it constant craving, but then Ashley ends up with that song stuck in her head for days.
"Sure."
"What do you want?"
Spencer's mind is so raw with sexual tension, all the time and every time she is around Ashley. Once she sees the brunette, she must touch her. Once she touches Ashley, she must kiss her. And once they kiss, Spencer slips into another damn world, perilously close to perfection.
And they've not even had sex yet. But it is building up. It is drawing nearer.
The beast is almost loose.
And Spencer has never felt like this before.
It is heady and it is wild and it is crazy. But she wouldn't trade this feeling for anything - not a million dollars, not to live forever.
So she leans in closer and brushes her lips against Ashley's, feeling the shock of aroused air between them with each chaste kiss bestowed.
"You."
Ashley cannot stop it from taking place, so she doesn't try to.
She moans aloud. And no one else can hear it, all of them caught up in the pandemonium of this party, another party at Jessica Barnes castle of a house.
But Spencer hears it.
And drinking doesn't sound like fun at all now.
\
It should have been locked, just like all the others.
But they didn't want to go to that study or office again, too close to the madness.
And this is where they met, where they found one another - months ago, one girl leaving and one girl going back in - so they feel it only right to complete this process of infatuation and lust and acceptance and happiness here, at Jessica Barnes party.
That and they cannot wait any longer. Maybe that's a shade more the truth than anything else.
But they found rooms with people getting sick and they found rooms with people making out. They found rooms sealed up tight like a drum. They found an ornate bedroom, with ugly wallpaper and lots of gold and peacock feathers all around.
Ashley said she'd have to be tripping on acid to enjoy sex in a room like that.
Spencer laughed and grabbed the girl by the wrist and they moved on.
They moved up the stairwell, down halls, until one door wasn't locked up.
And they open it, the hinges creaking just a bit, revealing a moon-lit section of wooden steps.
"Do we dare?" Spencer's voice coasts out and Ashley feels it, actually feels the girl's voice in every part of her body.
Warm and lovely and all she has ever longed for, right there, right beside her.
Ashley turns her head to face Spencer and grins.
"We do."
\
There is a naked boy running around the foyer, making some people laugh and making others shriek in an odd mixture of mirth and disgust.
He has a strand of lights hanging around his pale form, off his arms and dropping close to the parts of him no one truly wants to see.
Someone spilled the bowl of punch, which was spiked with a lot of alcohol, red rivers of liquid going into the grooves of the marble floor of the kitchen.
And it'll be hell to clean up for those poor Mexican maids that Jessica Barnes father hired.
Jessica is sitting on a couch, surrounded by music and a couple of 'friends', smoking a cigarette and half-listening to some girl talk about a cheerleading camp.
Or a Jesus camp.
Or something else all together, Jessica Barnes doesn't really care.
Jessica is drunk and amused by eveything while being simultaneously blasé about everything.
But that's the norm for a girl like Jessica Barnes, during the last significant party of the year, blinking lights and debauchery... Never knowing about that fairy tale spinning out in waves, far up above, in the attic that used to be her tower in the sky.
\
It's a little dusty and a little stuffy, but Spencer finds a window and unlatches it and pushes it open. And the air that floods in is cool but not cold, washing over her face and fluttering in her hair.
Ashley looks for a light switch, but does not find one. Nor a lamp. Not even a flashlight.
It does not seem to matter much, though.
Because over head there is pane after pane of glass, a view of the clouds shifting over a nighttime expanse, and every time it clears there is light.
The moon up there, mostly full, beaming down and creating this otherworldly glow of blue.
And there is a vanity table, with a hair-brush and haphazardly tossed down dolls upon it.
And a rocking horse sitting silent and various canopies hooked in the corners, holding toys.
Ashley reaches out and runs her fingertips over a pair of delicate wings pinned to the wall, with fuzzy material around the edges, a little girl's idea of magic - all over this room they have found, a quiet bit of magic and wonder while that party goes on downstairs.
It's like a whole other world.
And they are the only ones aware of it.
Spencer takes a deep breath and then turns around, the small confines of this space making her walk sort of bent over, so she drops to her knees and crawls instead.
It makes her giggle, which makes Ashley look over and Spencer catches that sweet smile as it blossoms on the brunette's face.
"What are you doing?"
"I'm too tall for this room."
And Ashley wants to wait patiently, knowing that each scuff of Spencer's jeans along the wood and carpet is bringing them closer.
But waiting is one thing she cannot do.
Ashley lowers herself to the floor, moving forward with speed to capture Spencer's lips with her own, loving the pleased gasp she gets in return.
They kiss, endless kisses, wrapped up in the taste and the texture of one another.
Spencer is trembling, actually shaking and feeling light-headed.
It could be the lack of air from kissing so much. It could be the room, obviously shut up for too long.
But she knows it is not really those things.
Well, maybe the kissing does play a part, but not because it steals oxygen from her lungs.
No, it's Ashley.
All Ashley.
It's cheesy as fuck, but Ashley takes her breath away.
And the kissing gets more aggressive, bodies getting closer, hands roaming, tongues slipping out to seek more. More sensation. More fire. More Spencer. More Ashley.
More... and Ashley is no longer even marginally upright, enveloped by Spencer, legs holding her and arms secure and fingers dancing along her neck.
More... and Spencer is reacting on pure instinct, pure need, making a not so subtle push with her hips and feeling Ashley respond in kind and teeth suddenly scrape along her exposed shoulder.
More... and Ashley feels palms go up and under her shirt and tremors rattle through her as Spencer follows the spine and slides along her sides and further down, teasing at what rests beneath that skirt.
More... and Spencer digs her nails in, finally, into Ashley's flesh and nearly comes undone when Ashley grinds down hard upon her, lips attached and breath labored.
And Ashley raises up, pulls her shirt off, bathed in moonlight.
And Spencer stares, for a moment, as if transfixed.
Which she is. Ashley is, too.
Transfixed by the fanned out blonde hair against the ground, like some kind of halo.
"You're beautiful... did you know that?" Ashley whispers, fingers moving slowly as they unbutton Spencer's top, one soft snap at a time.
Spencer didn't know. Not because she has low self-esteem or anything. It's just not something she's thought about, even if someone said it to her.
It didn't matter. What do looks matter, that's what she normally thinks.
But Ashley said she is beautiful. And that makes Spencer feel like the most gorgeous human being on the face of the Earth.
Well, next to Ashley that is.
And she wants to speak, wants to say that Ashley is the most lovely person to ever exist, wants to shout about this love until she loses her voice.
Words, though, are gone.
For they are touching - really touching - exploring the contours and the dips and the hollows.
They are touching - really touching - bare skin caressing as they run over each other like water, fluid and seamlessly.
They are saying everything to each other - really sharing, really speaking, really talking, really saying every single thing they can to each other.
In that tower in the sky, just the moon watching, as they fall a little deeper.
And then a little deeper still.
And deeper still.
\
end