After a twenty minute walk, David came back and held his daughter for the first time. The little girl didn't seem to know how to react. Then she spit up on daddy's shirt. Julie and Cassandra both had to laugh at the irony of it.
After a while he sat and played GI Joe with the boys for a while until supper was ready. The ladies invited him to stay, but he declined saying that Tiffany had a special dinner planned. This got a double eye-roll from the pair of women.
The
meeting that Cassandra had with the lawyer went very well, she helped Cassandra get a restraining order started, and divorce papers started.
The next couple of months went pretty smoothly for the ladies. Julie went back to work after
her maternity leave was over. Cassandra started a daycare out of their home. The daycare business was slow at first, then when Julie posted an ad at work, it filled up in no time.
So life wound up settling down to a semi-normal. The
girls leaned heavily on each other when they started getting depressed, but usually they were way to busy to worry about it. David took the kids pretty much every weekend, Johnny often tagging along.
As luck would have it, both ladies had
their court hearing to finalize their divorces the same week. You can believe they had an enormous divorce party the following weekend. All of their family and friends were in attendance, and the alcohol flowed freely.
After the last guest
had stumbled out the door, the ladies were left with a trashed living room. Cassandra was still slightly tipsy. Julie was absolutely trashed.
"You are my bestest friend in the whole wide world Cassy," slurred Julie, "I want you to live with
me forever and ever and ever and ever!"
"I love you too Julie."
"You don't understand, I want you to live with me until we die!"
"I know sweety, let me help you up to bed."
The next morning, Cassandra wass cooking
breakfast when Julie came downstairs. She had a decidedly greenish cast and wsa wearing sunglasses. She carried with her a bottle of aspirin.
"Some night last night," Cassandra stated as she handed Julie a glass of orange juice.
"Yeah,
no doubt," Julie commented as she accepted the orange juice and popped a couple of aspirin.
"You got kind of crazy last night."
"I promise I'll name it after you."
"Nothing like that. You just got all lovey dovey. I almost
thought you were going to propose to me."
Julie laughed. "What did I say or do?
"You kept going on about how I was your best friend and you wanted me to live with you forever."
"Why not?"
"What?"
"Why not live together
forever."
"What if I meet my dream guy?"
"You already did and he was an asshole."
"Ha ha very funny."
"Seriously Cassandra, who can take better care of you then I do? Who can love your son any more than I do?"
"I'm
not gay Julie"
"Neither am I."
"Then go date someone."
Cassandra looked puzzled.
"What are you suggesting Julie? Explain it to me."
"I heard a report on the news a couple of weeks ago on same sex marriages. I
got to thinking about it and how I would like to make a commitment to you."
"I reiterate...I'm not gay!"
"Neither am I...Please let me explain."
"I'm listening."
"We have been friends forever, I can't imagine being closer to any
guy than I am to you. Our children look at both of us as being their mothers. I could never imagine separating those two little boys....they are like brothers. No one can love each other's children more than we do."
"A woman
has needs."
"I know, but why does a marriage have to be about sex? If you want physical and romantic love, go find a bofriend, but never get serious and always come back home to your wife and kids. I think marriage should be
based on a deep emotional love and affection, that is what I want to offer you. I don't feel it necessary to include physical love, we can go elsewhere for that if we are so inclined."
Cassandra opened her mouth to reply, but no words would come
out. She felt she had reason to argue against it, to tell Julie she was insane, but each argument she came up with seemed ludicrous. Part of her wanted to make that commitment. Hell, Julie and her were better than best friends. They
shared the same brain, they were soulmates. Wait a minute soulmates? That suggested romantic involvement. Why should it? Cassandra was actually considering this wild idea.
She knew that they could simply live together,
but she knew there were legal privledges to marriage. Why not have legal custody of each other's kids? Why not have the power to speak for each other if they were incapacitated? There is no one she would trust more with that power.
She chuckled to herself, she did want to grow old with Julie. She could imagine it now, two old spinsters sitting together, each in their own rocking chair, each knitting their own project, and talking about their grandchildren.
In today's
society where divorce is running rampant, where some people seem to treat marriage like it is a more formal form of dating, this marriage seemed to make sense. She felt she could make a deeper, longer lasting commitment to Julie than she could to any
man.
"Cass! Hey Cassy! Earth to Cassandra!" Julie was waving her hand in front of Cassandra's face.
"Huh, what?
"You were daydreaming. So what do you say Cass? Is there wedding bells in our future?"
Cassandra's
expression started troubled, then suddenly cleared up. She had a look of ecstacy on her face. She straightened up tall and proud.
"Julie Alexander, I would be proud to be your wife."
Julie cheered and threw her arms around Cassandra.