Fic: it was almost like falling in love (this is a story of girl meets girl)
This idea came to me after reading a slightly ridiculous yet intriguing secret posted on F!S. I could not stop thinking about it, and somehow, this fic was the end result of those musings.
Title: it was almost like falling in love (this is a story of girl meets girl)
Pairing: Summer/Autumn [(500) Days of Summer]
Rating: PG
Words: 1671
Summary: The second reason she is very much sure of. The first, she is not.
she wants to know if i love her. that's all anyone wants from anyone else,
not love itself but the knowledge that love is there, like new batteries
in the flashlight in the emergency kit in the hall closet.
-- extremely loud & incredibly clear, jonathan safran foer
The first thing Summer says is, "What, you like the Smiths?"
It was all downhill from there.
Or uphill, really. It was downhill in the sense that it was easy, like falling. Autumn remembers reading that line in a poetry book in the old used bookstore across from her college. She used to go there on her Thursdays, since that was when she had her long lunch break in between classes. There was something relaxing about entering, as if simply smelling the books, worn and musty, was enough to make her forget about the homework she still had to finish and the take-home exam that was due next Monday. It was even better when she was reading, curled up in one of the over-sized armchairs that were scattered intermittently around the shop.
She didn't meet Summer at the bookstore. But of course, that's because it was five years later when she met Summer, and it was on the other side of the United States, in Los Angeles. She'd only just moved to L.A. a year and a half prior and was still getting used to the place. The music store was her favorite place to visit, though. It was only just downtown.
The second thing Summer says is, "Don't I know you from somewhere?"
;;
She did.
Summer had dated Tom, before getting married. They'd dated roughly a year or so, as far as Autumn knew. She was a bit hazy on all the details. Not that she really minded; the last thing she wanted to know about someone she was dating was who they were dating before her. Asking about that was just asking for trouble; she knew that once you started to think about it, you'd never stop. You'd be in line at the grocery store and suddenly you'd think, Was she prettier than me? Sexier? Did her hair look as bad as mine did when it wasn't blow dried straight?
Stupid things, of course. When it comes to past loves and exes, no one ever thinks clearly.
And then, of course, after the initial wondering, you'd start to get paranoid. You wouldn't be able to help it; it would just happen. It would be just as illogical as wondering whether or not she got better grades in college than you did, but still, you'd do it. And you wouldn't be able to stop. Which would all lead to the inevitable self-esteem issues and a weak spiral of lost control that would end in a break up that never should have happened in the first place.
So no, she didn't really know Summer. She'd seen a picture, once. She assumed Summer had seen one of her.
"You dated Tom," Autumn says, putting down the record she was holding. "So did I. I'm Autumn."
"Summer," Summer says.
"Yeah," Autumn tells her. "I mean, I know. Tom mentioned you. I saw a picture once."
"I got the picture, but not the name." Summer laughs. Her hair looks like five shades of brown in the yellow-tinted fluorescent shop lighting. Soft, too. Autumn is suddenly overcome by the desire to run her fingers through it. She doesn't, though, for a multitude of reasons. One being that she doesn't like girls. Another being that Summer is married.
(The second reason she is very much sure of. The first, she is not.)
"Right, Autumn," Summer is saying, while Autumn is still listing reasons off in her head and wondering how brown can have so many different shades. "Nice to meet you."
They shake hands. Summer's skin is pale and smooth against Autumn's own, which is tan from last week's vacation, where she spent all of her free time outside, on the beach. Warm, too, Autumn thinks, and it does nothing to help the whole doesn't like girls thing. Not at all.
"Nice to meet you too," she says.
;;
Summer is divorced.
It's the first thing she tells Autumn, right after she calls Autumn up for an impromptu lunch in the middle of a very slow Tuesday afternoon. It was strange, Autumn thought, that Summer had her number; it was only after a bit of thinking did she realize that Summer probably got it from Tom, given that they were still friends and all. Stranger, still, was the fact that even though Autumn had already eaten lunch, at the mere suggestion that Summer would want to meet her somewhere for lunch, she was hungry again.
That, was one thing she couldn't explain, though she spent the whole walk down to the little diner thinking about it.
"You know, I met my husband here. Or well, ex-husband now, technically." Summer is nonchalant. "I was sitting over there at the counter reading Dorian Gray and he walked in. We started talking and I just knew."
"About what?" Autumn's coffee has gone cold already. She sips it anyway.
Summer grins. "Well, love, of course."
"What, just like that?"
"Don't you believe in love?"
"I do," Autumn says, as their food arrives. A turkey sandwich for Summer and a garden salad for Autumn. She drowns it in ranch dressing before continuing, "I just think that love at first sight is sort of . . . Not true. Maybe attraction at first sight, sure. I won't deny that. But how can you know if you're going to love someone without even knowing them?"
"Well, maybe it's that initial attraction, then. It makes you want to know someone. And thus, love them."
"I thought Tom said you didn't believe in love."
Summer's laugh is light and vivacious. "Did he? That's not entirely true. I didn't, with him. Or maybe, I didn't before him. Or after him. But I do now, is my point. Maybe not quite as strongly, but yeah, I believe love exists. Maybe even love at first sight, too, but I'm less sure about that now."
Autumn stabs at a piece of lettuce. She has a meeting in an hour that she's dreading going to.
"So why'd you two break up?" Summer sips at her drink, leaning back in her chair, the sunlight reflecting off the ice and water in her glass. Autumn wonders if that always happens. It's oddly lovely. Maybe it's always happened and she's just never noticed it, until now.
She licks her lips, tries to focus. "We had more in common that we thought," Autumn says.
"Oh?"
"He met a nice boy named Winter," Autumn tells her.
Summer grins. "Yeah, really? I didn't know he -- "
"He does, apparently. Or well, he likes girls and boys. Or maybe girls and just this boy. I'm not quite sure. Neither is he, actually, but I suppose it doesn't really matter, does it? But he's happy and I'm . . . Well, happy too, I guess. I miss him, of course, but it's been almost half a year. You get over it, you know?"
"It's harder to get over a husband," Summer says. "I don't know why."
;;
"Why did you get divorced?" Autumn asks, sitting on Summer's couch. It's early fall; already the leaves have begun to change color. Summer's got her shades thrown wide open; from her apartment, you can see the parks, the greens fading into the yellows and oranges and reds that the close of summer brings.
(Autumn, Tom used to say. It's change.)
Summer is at the window, looking out.
"Why does it always happen?" Summer asks.
;;
Summer doesn't taste like summer at all.
She tastes like chocolate and licorice and broken hearts.
She makes Autumn think of jeans bleached by saltwater, of unkempt beds and lazy Saturday mornings, when the sun's still rising. Her hands, cupping Autumn's face, feel like an anchor to the ground. Without them there, she'll simply float away. Summer is her kite string; she is the kite. She is the infinite, endless amount of possibilities that extend onward, in every direction, from this one point in time. Summer is reality, the path in front of her.
"It's just a kiss," Summer says, when they break apart, eyes searching Autumn's face.
Autumn says, "No, it isn't," and allows herself to be pressed against her bed, Summer's hands moving from her face to her hair, tangling in the dark, loose curls, Summer's face so close to hers she can feel her warm breath against her skin. Summer kisses her, so neat and gentle, until it feels, to Autumn, as though time has begun to move backwards.
;;
Autumn, Summer mouths against Autumn's stomach, before kissing the exposed skin there. Autumn's shirt has long since been abandoned on the floor, forgotten and inside out. Summer's hands are light, experimental in their movements; one hand cups Autumn's breast, through her bra. The other is at her knee, fingers tracing small, teasing circles.
Autumn feels as though she is dissolving into molecules.
"We have time, don't we?" Summer says, looking up with her with impossibly wide, blue eyes. Autumn still hasn't figured out what sort of color blue they are. She thinks they're like Summer's hair, many shades all at once, ones she has never even known the names of before. Summer's hand slipping up from Autumn's hand to her knee, hovering just beneath the leg of her shorts.
Hours, Autumn thinks, wildly. Days and years and lifetimes. She brings Summer's other hand to her mouth, kissing her fingertips, one by one by one.
"Yeah," she says. "We do."
;;
Here is Summer, in a blue dress with white flowers. The blue doesn't match her eyes, but it makes them look brighter. The white flowers have streaks of yellow and a pastel green in them. Their centers are light pinks and purple hues, shadows traced and outlined with varying shades of gray. Autumn can smell her perfume from across the room, standing in front of her mirror and straightening out her shirt for the tenth time that evening. The perfume smells fruity. Like pears.
Summer's hair is still damp from the shower, bangs slightly lopsided from trying to trim them herself.
"So," she says, ready.
;;
Summer's mouth against hers, like their hearts pressed together.
Title: it was almost like falling in love (this is a story of girl meets girl)
Pairing: Summer/Autumn [(500) Days of Summer]
Rating: PG
Words: 1671
Summary: The second reason she is very much sure of. The first, she is not.
she wants to know if i love her. that's all anyone wants from anyone else,
not love itself but the knowledge that love is there, like new batteries
in the flashlight in the emergency kit in the hall closet.
-- extremely loud & incredibly clear, jonathan safran foer
The first thing Summer says is, "What, you like the Smiths?"
It was all downhill from there.
Or uphill, really. It was downhill in the sense that it was easy, like falling. Autumn remembers reading that line in a poetry book in the old used bookstore across from her college. She used to go there on her Thursdays, since that was when she had her long lunch break in between classes. There was something relaxing about entering, as if simply smelling the books, worn and musty, was enough to make her forget about the homework she still had to finish and the take-home exam that was due next Monday. It was even better when she was reading, curled up in one of the over-sized armchairs that were scattered intermittently around the shop.
She didn't meet Summer at the bookstore. But of course, that's because it was five years later when she met Summer, and it was on the other side of the United States, in Los Angeles. She'd only just moved to L.A. a year and a half prior and was still getting used to the place. The music store was her favorite place to visit, though. It was only just downtown.
The second thing Summer says is, "Don't I know you from somewhere?"
;;
She did.
Summer had dated Tom, before getting married. They'd dated roughly a year or so, as far as Autumn knew. She was a bit hazy on all the details. Not that she really minded; the last thing she wanted to know about someone she was dating was who they were dating before her. Asking about that was just asking for trouble; she knew that once you started to think about it, you'd never stop. You'd be in line at the grocery store and suddenly you'd think, Was she prettier than me? Sexier? Did her hair look as bad as mine did when it wasn't blow dried straight?
Stupid things, of course. When it comes to past loves and exes, no one ever thinks clearly.
And then, of course, after the initial wondering, you'd start to get paranoid. You wouldn't be able to help it; it would just happen. It would be just as illogical as wondering whether or not she got better grades in college than you did, but still, you'd do it. And you wouldn't be able to stop. Which would all lead to the inevitable self-esteem issues and a weak spiral of lost control that would end in a break up that never should have happened in the first place.
So no, she didn't really know Summer. She'd seen a picture, once. She assumed Summer had seen one of her.
"You dated Tom," Autumn says, putting down the record she was holding. "So did I. I'm Autumn."
"Summer," Summer says.
"Yeah," Autumn tells her. "I mean, I know. Tom mentioned you. I saw a picture once."
"I got the picture, but not the name." Summer laughs. Her hair looks like five shades of brown in the yellow-tinted fluorescent shop lighting. Soft, too. Autumn is suddenly overcome by the desire to run her fingers through it. She doesn't, though, for a multitude of reasons. One being that she doesn't like girls. Another being that Summer is married.
(The second reason she is very much sure of. The first, she is not.)
"Right, Autumn," Summer is saying, while Autumn is still listing reasons off in her head and wondering how brown can have so many different shades. "Nice to meet you."
They shake hands. Summer's skin is pale and smooth against Autumn's own, which is tan from last week's vacation, where she spent all of her free time outside, on the beach. Warm, too, Autumn thinks, and it does nothing to help the whole doesn't like girls thing. Not at all.
"Nice to meet you too," she says.
;;
Summer is divorced.
It's the first thing she tells Autumn, right after she calls Autumn up for an impromptu lunch in the middle of a very slow Tuesday afternoon. It was strange, Autumn thought, that Summer had her number; it was only after a bit of thinking did she realize that Summer probably got it from Tom, given that they were still friends and all. Stranger, still, was the fact that even though Autumn had already eaten lunch, at the mere suggestion that Summer would want to meet her somewhere for lunch, she was hungry again.
That, was one thing she couldn't explain, though she spent the whole walk down to the little diner thinking about it.
"You know, I met my husband here. Or well, ex-husband now, technically." Summer is nonchalant. "I was sitting over there at the counter reading Dorian Gray and he walked in. We started talking and I just knew."
"About what?" Autumn's coffee has gone cold already. She sips it anyway.
Summer grins. "Well, love, of course."
"What, just like that?"
"Don't you believe in love?"
"I do," Autumn says, as their food arrives. A turkey sandwich for Summer and a garden salad for Autumn. She drowns it in ranch dressing before continuing, "I just think that love at first sight is sort of . . . Not true. Maybe attraction at first sight, sure. I won't deny that. But how can you know if you're going to love someone without even knowing them?"
"Well, maybe it's that initial attraction, then. It makes you want to know someone. And thus, love them."
"I thought Tom said you didn't believe in love."
Summer's laugh is light and vivacious. "Did he? That's not entirely true. I didn't, with him. Or maybe, I didn't before him. Or after him. But I do now, is my point. Maybe not quite as strongly, but yeah, I believe love exists. Maybe even love at first sight, too, but I'm less sure about that now."
Autumn stabs at a piece of lettuce. She has a meeting in an hour that she's dreading going to.
"So why'd you two break up?" Summer sips at her drink, leaning back in her chair, the sunlight reflecting off the ice and water in her glass. Autumn wonders if that always happens. It's oddly lovely. Maybe it's always happened and she's just never noticed it, until now.
She licks her lips, tries to focus. "We had more in common that we thought," Autumn says.
"Oh?"
"He met a nice boy named Winter," Autumn tells her.
Summer grins. "Yeah, really? I didn't know he -- "
"He does, apparently. Or well, he likes girls and boys. Or maybe girls and just this boy. I'm not quite sure. Neither is he, actually, but I suppose it doesn't really matter, does it? But he's happy and I'm . . . Well, happy too, I guess. I miss him, of course, but it's been almost half a year. You get over it, you know?"
"It's harder to get over a husband," Summer says. "I don't know why."
;;
"Why did you get divorced?" Autumn asks, sitting on Summer's couch. It's early fall; already the leaves have begun to change color. Summer's got her shades thrown wide open; from her apartment, you can see the parks, the greens fading into the yellows and oranges and reds that the close of summer brings.
(Autumn, Tom used to say. It's change.)
Summer is at the window, looking out.
"Why does it always happen?" Summer asks.
;;
Summer doesn't taste like summer at all.
She tastes like chocolate and licorice and broken hearts.
She makes Autumn think of jeans bleached by saltwater, of unkempt beds and lazy Saturday mornings, when the sun's still rising. Her hands, cupping Autumn's face, feel like an anchor to the ground. Without them there, she'll simply float away. Summer is her kite string; she is the kite. She is the infinite, endless amount of possibilities that extend onward, in every direction, from this one point in time. Summer is reality, the path in front of her.
"It's just a kiss," Summer says, when they break apart, eyes searching Autumn's face.
Autumn says, "No, it isn't," and allows herself to be pressed against her bed, Summer's hands moving from her face to her hair, tangling in the dark, loose curls, Summer's face so close to hers she can feel her warm breath against her skin. Summer kisses her, so neat and gentle, until it feels, to Autumn, as though time has begun to move backwards.
;;
Autumn, Summer mouths against Autumn's stomach, before kissing the exposed skin there. Autumn's shirt has long since been abandoned on the floor, forgotten and inside out. Summer's hands are light, experimental in their movements; one hand cups Autumn's breast, through her bra. The other is at her knee, fingers tracing small, teasing circles.
Autumn feels as though she is dissolving into molecules.
"We have time, don't we?" Summer says, looking up with her with impossibly wide, blue eyes. Autumn still hasn't figured out what sort of color blue they are. She thinks they're like Summer's hair, many shades all at once, ones she has never even known the names of before. Summer's hand slipping up from Autumn's hand to her knee, hovering just beneath the leg of her shorts.
Hours, Autumn thinks, wildly. Days and years and lifetimes. She brings Summer's other hand to her mouth, kissing her fingertips, one by one by one.
"Yeah," she says. "We do."
;;
Here is Summer, in a blue dress with white flowers. The blue doesn't match her eyes, but it makes them look brighter. The white flowers have streaks of yellow and a pastel green in them. Their centers are light pinks and purple hues, shadows traced and outlined with varying shades of gray. Autumn can smell her perfume from across the room, standing in front of her mirror and straightening out her shirt for the tenth time that evening. The perfume smells fruity. Like pears.
Summer's hair is still damp from the shower, bangs slightly lopsided from trying to trim them herself.
"So," she says, ready.
;;
Summer's mouth against hers, like their hearts pressed together.