Kimberly

Kimberly leaned close to Lil. "I'm not a lesbian," the redhead said. Her perfume filled Lil's nostrils. Kimberly glanced over at the grey-skirted blonde with knee boots and a tight navy turtleneck sitting on the bench across from them. She seemed to be studying her receipt.

"Maybe you are if you meet the right girl. Have you ever been happy with a man?" Lil retorted.

"Maybe. With the right girl," Kim said. She fiddled with the knot of the bun holding her hair up. "But I don’t think I’m ready for that."

"Gonna take another chance with the assholes?" Lil asked.

Kimberly laughed. "Oh, come on!" she said. "It's not that bad all the time! Men are lots of fun."

Lil looked down, flashing back on how Steve had treated her, finally brazenly cheating on Lil with her red-headed co-worker Colleen. She sighed and looked back up at Kim.

Kim nodded. "Okay, maybe it's been that bad for you," she said.

Lil didn't say anything, just looking. At least Kim didn't look much like Colleen apart from the red hair and green eyes. Kim was taller and leaner-built except for her ample breasts, with more structure to her face than Colleen's soft curves and dimples. And Kim had no freckles. Lil smiled. "Yeah, kinda," she said. "So what should a girl do? Date men as long as it's fun, then marry a woman who respects her?"

Kim guffawed. "Hah!" she said. "But aren't you worried about that, that lesbian, uh..."

"Lesbian bed ****?" Lil asked. She laughed. "You know more than you were letting on, Kim." Lil winked. "I guess I'd have to go back to men, then. Or my trusty dildo." They both giggled.

Kimberly took a breath. She and Lillian glanced over to the woman on the bench opposite.

The blonde smiled, crossing her shapely legs, her skirt sliding down her thigh. She looked Lil and Kimberly up and down once, and once again.

Kimberly leaned closer yet. Lil could smell her sweet breath. "That woman keeps giving us, you know, that look," Kimberly whispered. "Do you think she wants to hit on us?"

"Maybe," Lil whispered back. "Or she's just listening in. You want to walk and talk?"

"'Kay," Kimberly said. She giggled. "It's like back in school. Let's see if we can lose her."

Lillian and Kimberly strolled through the mall, Lil walking fast to keep up with Kimberly's long stride.

After the blonde was out of sight, Lil said, "You know, I think she was a lesbian."

"Oh?" Kimberly said.

Lil said, "I got a look at her hands, and she has medium long nails on one, but short on the other."

"Maybe she plays a musical instrument?" Kimberly said.

"Well, there's this girl Alison I know," Lil said. "She said to look at a woman's hands, and you can get clues about her. Short on one hand and medium long on the other is one of the lesbian patterns, that's what Alison said."

"Why?" Kim asked.

Lil said, "Well, there's one hand to show off, like with nail polish." She glanced at Kimberly's polished fingernails. "And medium long is a good length for scratching someone's back or, um, other parts of the skin. And fingers with short nails are for, um, putting inside. Without scratching."

"Oh," Kim said. "Right."

"Hey," Lil said, squinting at Kim's face. "You have a lipstick smear."

Kim looked in a small mirror on a sunglasses display. "Oops. Biting my lips again. Need to kick those nervous habits," she said.

Lil laughed. "Or the jerks who give them to you," she said.

"Yeah, maybe," Kim said. "Is there a restroom nearby?" she asked Lillian. "I hate fixing my face in front of everyone."

Lil raised an eyebrow. Kim was wearing only eyeliner and a bit of orange-red lipstick. Not that much to fix. Was she being serious? "There's a ladies' room in the basement of Whitefield's," Lil said. She pointed to the entrance to the department store nearby. "Practically nobody uses it."

They crossed the mall's main corridor to Whitefield's and took the stairs down to the basement. Past the credit office and the photo studio, around an unattended gift wrapping window was a door engraved WOMEN in white on a dark wood-grain sign.

"Where's the men's?" Kim asked.

"It's on some crazy half-floor," Lil said. "My brother says it's like a half flight down from the shoe department or something."

There was a small vestibule with a sofa. Across the room was a chair in front of a shelf backed with a lighted mirror.

"Cool, it's a ladies' lounge!" Kimberly said.

"Whitefield's, where time stands still," Lil said. She laughed. "There's still an ashtray in the corner. Nothing in it, though."

Kim snapped open a miniature purse and started repairing her smudged lipstick. "Were you serious when you were talking about your dildo?" she asked Lil. "I thought they were pretty much a porno fantasy for guys."

"No, I have it in my purse," Lillian said. "You want to see it?"

"Sure," Kimberly said.

Lillian took out a soft-sided oblong case that looked like it could have held a small curling iron and accessories. She zipped it open and unfolded it on the shelf next to Kim.

"Oh my," Kim said. She took a deep breath, stretching her sleeveless blue shirt over her ample chest. She saw a lavender silicone phallus with a realistic cock head and a mid-rib that went down to a flared circular base. There was a little egg-shaped gadget that must be a compact vibrator. A little tube of lubricant. A packet of baby wipes. Some condoms to save hassling clean-up. And there were two dildos about half the length of the first one. One was a smooth four-inch peg with a head pointed like a softly rounded pencil tip. The other was the same length, but swelled into a bulge in the middle before curving back into a narrow, short stem. "God, where did you get all this?" Kim asked.

"My Aunt Judy in New York sent them," Lil said.

"You must, um, have quite a family," Kim said.

"Actually she's in by marriage," Lil said. "She married...well, you know, has a civil union with my mom's sister Grace. But I think the gift was my mom's suggestion. She didn't want to embarrass me by giving it to me herself."

Kim's face turned pink. "Umm. Wow," she said. "So what are the short ones for?" Kim asked.

"Oh, those?" Lil said, touching the straight and the bulging mini dildos. "They're anal toys. The fat one goes in and stays there, you know, and you can feel it. The straight one is if you want to feel something going in and out. I'm not in the mood for them very often, but I think Judy and Aunt Grace use them a lot."

Kim's pink flush deepened.

"You feeling okay, Kim?" Lil asked.

But just then there was a noise from the direction of the ladies' room proper. Lillian and Kimberly, startled, clutched each others' arms and looked round.