Baby Steps

Chapter 11 - The Family Reunion

Lisa's Point of View
"Lisa? Are you paying any attention to me?" Faye asked me as I brushed eyeshadow onto my eyes.
"Yes?" I replied, I half had, but I'd got confused and given up after a while.
"Okay then, in that case you will know which topics we are avoiding talking about and with who. Go." Faye replied, she wasn't doing it to be cruel, more just to ensure I didn't upset her family.
"I'm not allowed to start conversations about Steps with Dotty... Danny once she's drunk, though as far as I can tell she always is." I mean it wasn't a lie, all the stories Faye had told me about the other members of the Bourne family they all drunk like Faye and I liked to on tour. "Rugby is urhm... Aron, Ari, Sammy and urmmm... oh god Josh?"
"And Dan. I feel as though you want to get beaten up by my cousins!" She laughed, came up behind me and hugged me. "Better plan - in the interest of not being the cause of a family argument, just don't mention rugby at all. Or Bond films, I mean you don't exactly know anything about them." She grinned at me in the mirror at the end.
I rolled my eyes at being reminded of my pub quiz failing. "This is why we can't do pub quizzes!" I replied but I smiled too.
"Being fair my Scottsie Bear, if you just talk about anything you do normally everyone will love you anyway, you have so many charms sweetie." She said.
I grinned again, and went back to applying my eye shadow. She went back across the room and set about brushing her hair. I was greatly looking forwards to this, to meeting her family and also to getting drunk with her again (as much as we enjoyed it generally speaking we didn't really get drunk at home, mostly because it wasn't as fun as it was if you could sing along to the music and befriend people you will never speak to again).

I knew what shoes I wanted to wear down there, but I had no idea where I'd packed them, or indeed if I'd packed them.
"Come onnnnnnnn" Faye whined.
"I'm coming. I'm coming." I said, pulling my shoes out by the heal I'd managed to grab.
She grinned, knowing that whenever I said I was ready I usually wasn't. I slipped my feet into my shoes and battled the buckle on the side. I couldn't get the damn strip of fabric into the buckle, let alone get the pin in the hole. Faye sighed and knelt down, gently doing up the shoes for me. She didn't need to ask how tight they needed to be because the one size hole I used was very obvious.
She stood up opposite me, adjusted our little shared bag so it wasn't falling off her shoulder, and kissed me softly on the lips. We pulled apart, both suddenly remembering our makeup. "Okay so now you're ready, shall we?" She asked, offering me her hand.
I smiled and took her hand. "Of course." I said.
Before we were more than a few steps from our room's door she'd slipped her hand round my waist.

Faye's point of view
I was slightly worried for my family's reaction to Lisa, so before we walked into the room I took her hand again. I'd never actually told many of them about my sexuality (unsurprising given how little time my mum had known), and as much as I knew my cousins would catch on I was worried about my nan and my aunties more than anyone else.
"Ah Faye baby you're here, looking lovely as ever." My mum said, taking me in a gentle hug. When she let me go she looked over Lisa before taking her into a hug too. "Oh and Lisa my darling how beautiful you look like that."
I glanced at Lisa and saw she was blushing. "Sorry" I mouthed to her as she looked over at me. She smiled.
"It's fine" She mouthed back.
"Come talk to your nan I'm sure she's desperate to see you baby." My mum said taking my hand and leading me across the room.
I tried not to groan, though at least it made the explaining easier as a majority of my older relatives were on a table together, watching as my cousins and the other younger relatives danced or got pissed.
"Mum, this is Faye and Lisa." My mum said to my nan.
My nan looked me over, stood up shakily and hugged me. "So good to see you my little pop star princess." She said. "And lovely to meet your friend too." she added, shaking Lisa's hand before sitting back down.
Lisa's other hand was still in mine, and she showed no sign of letting go. We'd discussed that I'd like to tell my aunts, uncles and nan, but she was still on edge because of how her family finding out had gone. We'd never really brought it up since we'd been dating, but I feel as though the night she'd opened up to me about 'the girl' she'd loved being me and I'd been horrible to her played a part in her fear of telling people about us too, even though we'd long since moved on from that. I looked at her to check she was still comfortable with me telling them, and she nodded but squeezed my hand a little tighter anyway.
"Actually nan, and actually all of you here who care, Lisa and I are dating." I said. Lisa squeezed my hand so tightly I was sure she was going to cut off the blood supply. When I was met by a few confused stares I took a deep breath. "I'm interested in dating girls, so Lisa is my girlfriend, in the same way as you were once grampie's girlfriend nana."
My nan smiled and her eyes lit up a little bit. "Oh my pop star princess, of course you'd be the one to have a girlfriend." She said smiling a little.
Lisa's grip on my hand loosened as she realised this wasn't going to be a repeat of her situation. She smiled at my relatives. "Hello, uhm yes I'm Lisa and Faye and I are dating." She said, her voice much quieter than normal.
My Aunty Lucy got up from the table, ran round and hugged Lisa. It was clear Lucy was slightly drunk already, it was where Dotty (despite her name being Danielle we called her Dotty or often to avoid confusion with mum Dotty-Danny) got it from after all. "Why are you so scared? We're not scary!"
Lisa smiled at my aunt. "Well I'm not scared of you guys, just of telling people in our, Faye and I I mean's, families about us. My dad didn't exactly take it too well when he found out."
Mercifully, if our fight was a reason she was scared to tell people about us, she refrained from mentioning it.
My aunt smiled at her. "Aww darlin'. Well I think it's lovely that you two are in love. You both look so happy with each other."