moonlight on canvas

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Lottie was looking at her right now though, with a heat in her eyes that made Lisa feel warm all over. She barely managed to suppress a shiver when she felt the other woman’s hand on her back, slipping down low, just above the curve of her ass, which she didn’t necessarily believe was curvy at all. She hoped that wouldn’t matter to Lottie.

Her teeth found her bottom lip the moment Lottie twirled one of Lisa’s curls around her finger and she bit down, hard. Lest she let out an embarrassing noise. God, Lisa loved it when people played with her hair, the mere idea of someone gently massaging her scalp with their fingers almost enough to make her limbs dissolve into jelly.

If Lottie didn’t like girls, then that was going to be a huge loss for the lesbian community. Because as much as Lisa liked to have faith in all gay girls, not all of them knew how to make another girl melt in the way Lottie was right now.

Or maybe Lisa was just way, way too easy.

Thankfully, an answer came soon. In a way that Lisa hadn’t realised was even an option.

The moment Lottie kissed her, Lisa let out a surprised noise, a soft moan catching at the back of her throat. Immediately, she relaxed into the kiss, realising it had been way too long since the last time she’d made out with someone. Her eyes fluttered shut and she slid her arms around Lottie, quickly kissing her back.

The bookstore and all its partygoers disappeared around her as she sank right into the feeling of Lottie’s lips on hers. When Lisa kissed someone, she was all too aware that it could be a brief, fleeting thing, so she wanted to be present in it for as long as she was allowed to be. Her hand gently cradled the side of Lottie’s face as their lips moved together, her heart beating overtime in her chest.

“Wow, we’re sort of speedrunning this,” she joked, feebly, breathlessly. “I guess that answers the ‘are you into girls?’ question, but my next move was trying to figure out if you were into me.”

The tip of her nose brushed Lottie’s as she moved in closer, her breath coming in shallow little pants. She lifted her gaze to catch Lottie’s eye, smiling gently.

“Um, again? Maybe?”

But now Lisa was asking for more, not seeming to mind the fact that Lottie had skipped over all the small talk and most of the steps that came before planting one on a total stranger in the middle of a party. It was exhilarating, and her selfish, horny mind couldn’t help but wonder just how far the two of them could take this. 

Lottie kissed her again, this time glossing over whatever shyness she’d seemingly exhibited just moments before. Her tongue swiped delicately at the parting of Lisa’s lips, pushing into the other girl’s open mouth, a laugh chasing the action as she giggled delightedly into the kiss. Her hand was nestled against Lisa’s hip, holding her against her, altogether aware that neither of them were dancing anymore, the dancefloor moving steadily around them as countless couples and groups of friends made use of the space correctly, rather than for their own attempt at PDA. 

“Can confirm. Very into you,” Lottie whispered as they broke apart momentarily, placing a little unneeded reassurance to the blonde’s earlier concerns. 

If it wasn’t clear that she was into her now, she didn’t know what else she needed to do. But she was more than willing to give anything a try, so long as Lisa was up for it. 

Her hand shifted effortlessly from Lisa’s hip to her waist, before circling around to the small of her back entirely. Feeling cheeky, she let her hand slip a couple of inches lower, before settling against the pretty blonde’s ass. She deepened the kiss, enjoying rush of arousal that spread through her at getting to just freely kiss another girl like this, with no hesitation and no concern that she might get rejected any second now. 

“Did you wanna get out of here?” Lottie found herself whispering, the harsh boom of the speakers almost drowning her words. 

Almost immediately, she heard them echo back through her mind, realising just how presumptuous she’d sounded. 

“I meant the dancefloor, like, maybe we could find a dark corner to go make out in?” she clarified, not wanting to seem like a total sex-pest right off the bat. Then, she laughed. “Or, y’know, the first thing. If you’re up for that.” 

As Taylor Swift’s most wedding-y love song filtered through the speakers of A Novel Idea, Lisa couldn’t help but think that maybe, if she believed in things like fate and karma, the universe might be trying to tell her something.

“But if I did plan this, it would be pretty smooth, right?” she said, her eyes twinkling as she wrinkled her nose good-naturedly.

Of course she knew the lyrics. She and Rachel had grown up scream-singing the words to Taylor’s greatest hits into their hairbrushes. And, unfortunately, she’d seen a bunch of TikTok edits to her brother set to ‘Gorgeous’. She dutifully forwarded them to him to boost his ego but there were still things a little sister didn’t want to dwell on. She’d never envisioned standing in the middle of a twinkly-lit bookstore on the most romantically charged night of the year (yeah, even beating you out, V-Day!) dancing to a slower ballad, in the arms of one of the most beautiful women she’d ever seen. She certainly hadn’t planned it but, boy, was this scenario not straight out of her wildest imaginings!

“I like that name. Lottie,” she smiled, thinking it suited the other woman well. ‘Charlotte’ was pretty but ‘Lottie’ was fun and her new dance partner had proved to be an extraordinary mix of both.

Heart beating overtime in her chest, she kept her hands on Lottie’s shoulders before bravely stepping forwards, sliding her arms around the woman’s neck. Now they were properly slow dancing. Like, prom slow dancing. Except Lisa wasn’t a teen with braces anymore and there was no chaperone ready to swat at them with a rolled-up magazine and tell them to keep at least three inches apart. 

“Do you like girls?” she blurted out. Immediately, she ducked her head and began laughing at herself. Squinting up at Lottie, she offered her a meagre shrug. “You just never really know! I’ve never exactly slow danced before with a straight girl but I’m not saying they don’t. With their friends or whatever. But I thought I’d better check…” She winced a little. “And if that freaks you out, I’m sorry. Not for being gay, duh. Just for maybe pushing something. Am I pushing something?”

She shook her head, and scolded herself. “Oh, shut up, Lisa.”

“I would agree that you’re very smooth,” Lottie told the other girl disarmingly, as her hand gently settled into the slope of Lisa’s waist. 

It was surprisingly charming on Lottie’s end. She didn’t think of herself as somebody with a lot of game, and she wasn’t much of a flirt either. Usually, she got by on her smarts more than anything else. She’d had brief flings with athletes whose teams she’d worked for – maybe it wasn’t the most professional dynamic in the world, but it was hard not to feel a little tension when you were constantly caressing their muscles and massaging them back to health. She’d once had the great pleasure of tending to a driver’s hamstring, only to be greeted several seconds later by their growing erection. Sufficed to say, she didn’t get out a lot, which meant most of her relationships – if you could even call them that – tended to be of the workplace variety. 

For now, she thought she was doing a pretty good job of not messing this up. 

The moment Lisa complimented her name and curved her arms around Lottie’s neck, she knew she was a goner. If she didn’t get to kiss this girl soon, she thought she might die. Or, at the very least, show up at Ozzie’s unwanted, with a tub of ice cream that she didn’t plan to share and a miserable attitude that she did. Instinctively, she felt herself edge closer to her, one hand firmly pressed to the small of her back, while Lottie lifted her other hand to gently tug at a loose curl that had fallen into the other girl’s face. Instead of tucking it behind her ear, Lottie let it twirl around her finger, deftly enjoying the silky softness of her pretty blonde locks. 

By the time Lisa asked for clarification, Lottie was so far gone that she’d been daydreaming of making out messy style in the furthest corner of the bookstore. She blinked in surprise, before a wide smile stretched across her face. And, truthfully? Lisa’s rambly tangent only endeared her further to her, and Lottie found herself doing something so entirely out of character and brave – by her standards, at least – that she was positive Felix would never believe her when she told him. 

Right then, as Lisa scolded herself, Lottie kissed her. She surged forward, clumsy in her approach as she silenced the pretty girl in her arms by parting her lips with her own, a content moan escaping her the exact second their mouths made contact. 

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Her mom had often told her that, as much as she loved Bella just as fiercely as Lisa did, she worried that her daughter had been robbed of a bunch of youthful experiences that everyone else her age had under their belt. At the time, Lisa had tried to hide how offensive she found that, but she understood her mom now. If she hadn’t dropped out of college to look after her daughter then it was highly possible that she would have spent her four years at NYU doing what all the other students did: balancing work and play. And if she had done that, then she might not have had to rely on a Nintendo Wii game to teach her about rhythm.

She bounced on the makeshift dancefloor, out of time with the music and her sneakers probably squeaking gratingly against the floor. Not that anyone could hear them above the music.

The woman in front of her seemed happy to throw herself into the song, dancing without a care in the world. Lisa distantly wished that maybe she’d stretched herself to at least two vodka sodas, just to loosen up a little bit more.

Does it really matter? she asked herself. It’s New Year’s Eve! Nobody cares! You’ll probably never see this woman again!

With that thought in mind, she stopped thinking about what everyone else in the store would be thinking of her dance moves (not that she was aware of anyone looking at her bar her new dance partner). She tipped her head back with a laugh at the woman’s enthusiastic singing and nodded her head, immediately joining in. 

“Looking out for another! Anyone will do! You’re in the mood for a dance!” She bumped her hips to the beats of the song in a way she’d only ever felt brave enough to do in the privacy of her own apartment. As she bounced again, her hands flew to the corset of her dress, hiking it up a little so she wouldn’t embarrass herself with a mortifyingly revealing nip-slip. This was her little sister’s dress, she remembered, and Rachel had a lot more going on upstairs than she did. 

Fingers pinching the top of her dress, she leaned forward, hoping her voice would carry over the short distance.

“I’m Lisa, by the way!” she called out, before she cut herself off with a surprised squeak. Someone bumped her from behind, sending her flying into the woman in front of her. Her hands, still holding onto her corset, weren’t quick enough to stop her as she all but collided with the stranger.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, hands suddenly flying to the woman’s shoulders as she tried to stand upright again.

The last thing she’d anticipated from her night was getting to dance with a beautiful girl while they screamed along to ABBA at the top of their lungs. At best she had assumed Dante might offer up a peck on the cheek out of sheer pity alone while she lingered in the corner, as she always did, watching Annie have the time of her life, surrounded by all her loved ones. Between Dante, Jax and Elias alone, her cousin was always surrounded by handsome men who worshipped the ground she walked on, and that didn’t even account for the endless list of friends and admirers she had. Charlotte Baxter was a far cry from being the girl that danced at parties with pretty girls who somehow, by some stroke of luck, actively wanted to be seen with her. 

Lisa. A pretty name for a pretty girl. Lottie smiled back at her, ready to pitch her voice high above the booming music so she could introduce herself in turn, only for her eyes to widen in surprise as the other woman came crashing towards her. She gasped, her instincts kicking in as she took a sudden step forward, ready to catch her. While the stranger behind her certainly hadn’t meant to bump Lisa, Lottie had witnessed her own fair share of sprained ankles and torn ligaments over the most meagre of stumbles. And as well-equipped as she was to help nurse those types of injury back to health, she didn’t want that to be Lisa’s fate. 

Her hand slipped to Lisa’s waist almost instinctively, arm curling around her as her hand fit steadily at the small of her back. With Lisa’s hands now pressed against her shoulders, the two found themselves practically chest to chest, nose to nose, and Lottie’s eyes were wide with shock. She hadn’t quite banked on both of their reflexes being so fast, and she only hoped her new friend didn’t think she was being overly forward or presumptuous. Before she could try and explain herself, however, the DJ and the Universe decided to really play a trick on her by slowly trickling Taylor Swift’s Lover across the room. 

“Wow! Really smooth. Did you plan this?” Lottie laughed, teasing the other woman. Obviously neither of them could have banked on the sudden shift in vibes, but she figured they could at least joke about it. 

Have I known you 20 seconds or 20 years?  

“I’m Charlotte, by the way! Or Lottie,” she amended, much preferring the nickname. She still held tight to Lisa, forgetting herself entirely, and it took until about 30 seconds into the song for her to realise that she’d begun swaying, guiding the other woman’s body along with her own. 

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ren faire! I didn’t EXACTLY make mine and lettie’s costumes from scratch, but I did put them together from bits and pieces that I thrifted.

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She often wondered how obtuse she would have continued to be if it hadn’t been for that horrible first time. After waking up unsatisfied in sheets that strongly smelled of Axe bodyspray (and unbeknownst to her a very, very mini Bella in her womb), her lack of interest in men had hit her with startling clarity, but it always struck her as odd that she’d had to go to those lengths to reach that moment of realisation. Surely if a beautiful woman had just stood in front of her in a red mini-dress with knee high boots hugging her calves, she would have had an epiphany much sooner.

A quick once over of the woman in front of her confirmed it for Lisa. She was still gay. Gay as ever! And a little bit tipsy.

“Oh, I get you. I mean, everyone loves ABBA. But I like, love ABBA,” she explained over the familiar musical notes that had got her through her awkward teenage years. She wasn’t breaking new ground by declaring her love for a group that were so far from being underground that their popularity was near-stratospheric, but she liked to think that she appreciated ABBA in a manner that went beyond that of the typical music listener.

She remembered when Colin had been taken aback by the ferocity with which she demanded to accompany him to Wimbledon, only to realise she had ulterior motives. Flying to London with her brother meant leaving Bella in his care for the night and purchasing the first set of ABBA Voyage tickets she could get her hands on. She’d spent the whole night crying in front of four holographic images that she had declared Swedish royalty from the moment she could open her mouth and sing (adorably off-key, as her father had described it).

With her one vodka soda in danger of revealing her to be an ABBA freak in front of the capital-HG Hot Girl in front of her, she felt her cheeks heat up when she realised the other woman was checking her out. Although maybe it was in a way that just meant she appreciated Lisa’s fashion choices for the night. Desperately glad that she’d borrowed Rachel’s corset dress, squeezing herself into it instead of one of her usual boring outfits, she remembered the white sneakers and suddenly wished she’d worn something more attractive, like a strappy heel.

But heels and dancing were a dangerous combination for someone like Lisa. And as soon as the other woman asked to dance with her, that was all she wanted to do.

“Really?” she asked, her face lighting up. Again, the alcohol was making it easy for her to bring her enthusiasm to the surface. She found herself nodding way too eagerly, following the woman onto the makeshift dance floor.

“Just so you know, I’m not really good at dancing!” she warned her, awkwardly bopping on the spot for a moment as a warm-up. She wasn’t being modest either. There was a reason their parents had to buy a new television after one of her and Rachel’s more vigorous Just Dance sessions.

“I get it. I won’t try and fight you for the top spot,” she teased, biting her lip. She liked ABBA well enough, but she could be a number one card carrier of their fan club and she’d still let her new dance partner take the win. 

Maybe it was the single cocktail she’d had all night, but there was something about a beautiful woman’s enthusiasm that sent a giddy buzz shooting down Lottie’s spine. It made her want to be braver, like she thought she could push down all her fears and uncertainties just to make a pretty girl laugh.  

But the thing was, Lottie wasn’t an exceptional dancer herself. She had rhythm, there was no denying that, and with Annie’s expertise on the dancefloor she’d definitely picked up a move or two from her cousin. But mostly, she shied away from anything that brought her too much attention. Tonight, she didn’t seem to mind anymore, which had everything to do with how mind bogglingly beautiful the woman across from her was, and very little to do with any real skill. 

“Don’t even sweat it! I don’t really dance either,” she reassured her with a gentle smile. 

Now, with the two of them edging ever closer to one another, Lottie began swaying on the spot. Honestly, she looked a little stupid. It was Dancing Queen, for fuck’s sake. The song kind of insisted upon a little more movement, maybe even some hip action at the very least. It was sort of in the name. Feeling bashful, she ducked her head with a shy smile before deciding fuck it, and stretching her arms out to the blonde, palms upward, fingers wiggling. 

“C’mon, let’s fucking dance!” Lottie insisted, letting out a loud shriek of laughter. What the fuck else was New Year’s for if not to impress hot girls you’d never see again and embarrass yourself in front of a crowd of people who already loved your cousin a whole lot more than you anyway? 

And with that sentiment, Lottie pulled the stranger’s hands into her own and began jumping on the spot, putting as much welly into it as her knee-highs would allow. They were pretty thick heels, sturdy enough that she didn’t think they’d collapse under the weight of her bouncing around. Giggling, she swayed her hips as she hopped on the spot, dress fanning around her thighs, hair whipping across her face. 

As the song picked up, Lottie found herself no longer caring what everyone around her thought. And, as it turned out, nobody gave a single shit about the two young girls dancing on the dancefloor. Who knew? So, she lifted her voice and screamed along with ABBA, catching the girl across from her’s eye as she did. 

“You’re a teaser you turn ‘em ooooooooooonnnnn! Leave ‘em burning and then you’re.... gooooone!” she cried out, flushed to her cheeks. It had been too long since she’d been so carefree. 

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