Previously.....

Tina: ‘’ Did you sleep with her In our bed?’’   

Bette: ‘’ No Tina, I wouldn’t do that to you.’’

Tina: ‘’ Well you slept with her Bette.’’

Bette: ‘’ I know Tina, I swear that we did not come into our home. Tina it is over, I’ve not seen her since Provocations’’

Tina: ‘’ So it’s over then?’’

Bette: ‘’I swear Tina, It is so over. I love you, you are my life and I’m sooo sorry that I’ve hurt you. We can fix this and start again, I know we can.’’

Tina: ‘’ How do I know that I can trust you again?’’

Bette took a moment and looked at Tina and asked.

Bette: ‘’Tina, you have to believe me that you can trust me. Look we can take this as slow as you want, at your pace. Whatever you want I’ll do it. Just answer me this question....... Do you still Love Me?’’

Chapter 8

Tina sat in silence thinking about her answer. Then stood up in front of Bette.

Tina: ‘’ Bette, it’s not about loving you, you know that I love you, I always will. It’s about the most fundamental part of our relationship, of any relationship. It’s about trust.

Do you remember when we had dinner at Tim’s that night and you instinctively saw what was going on between Jenny and Marina. You thought it was wrong and you challenged Marina about what she was doing. She said that she wasn’t doing anything wrong. Is that what you were thinking when you.......you were shacked up with her in a hotel room?

You felt so strong about your conviction, that you thought I was being so blarzay about the situation. I love you for your conviction’s  and the way you stand by them, but to then go and do what Marina did, it makes you look like you have got double standards, you just look false.

I wanted you so much to take care of me, like you used too, but I think that our downfall was way before I lost the baby. When I gave up my job I got stuck into this little housewife routine, that I lost my own identity and I let it happen, you aren’t totally to blame for that, but you got lost in your job, trying more than ever to prove yourself to those idiots at the CAC that you lost time for us. We lost time for us.

You started to expect me to take care of you and not for us to take care  of each other. I mean you even expected me to still pick up your dry cleaning when you knew that I was full time at the centre. You became a typical old fashioned husband, that expected the little wife to do all the housework. I thought that we were in a partnership and we would share those sorts of chores together, you were already out of this relationship then.

I let you turn me into this victim, I lost my identity, trying to make a home for us and our future family. I just don’t know if I can trust you again. Not after this, I thought, what we had was sacred, we were so different from all the other lesbians that we know that can’t find that special someone, so they spend their lives moving from one  person to the next.

I mean If I didn’t find out that night, would you still be seeing her now behind my back?

Tina sat down opposite a stunned Bette as she waited for a response. She sighed deeply not realising how exhausted that speech had made her.