Know Better, Do Better
Everybody, Everybody Wants To Love
Everybody, Everybody Wants To Be Loved
“Willow, breakfast!”
Tara set a stack of pancakes in the middle of the table and Sally immediately stuck her fork into one and brought it to her plate, drowning it in syrup.
Willow appeared from the bedroom a few moments later and smiled at the scene.
“Ooh, pancakes can go in bellies,” she swung her shoulders excitedly, “Why’d you let me sleep in?”
“Because you deserve it,” Tara smiled and Willow popped a sweet, languid kiss to her cheek.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning,” Tara replied sweetly.
“GoOd moRniNg,” Sally mocked and snickered as her lips glistened with sticky syrup.
Willow glanced at Tara, whose eyes flashed with sadness. She recognized the look; Tara had often given it to her growing up when Willow had expressed something in the latest of her parental neglect saga. She knew her girlfriend’s heart was aching for a little girl so cynical beyond her years that a simple expression of affection seemed trite.
Willow took Tara’s hand under the table and gave it a squeeze and Tara looked at her. Willow again recognized the look, this time from the mirror.
Feeling seen.
Tara just gave a sad smile and reached up, brushing some of Willow’s hair to the side before turning her attention back to the table to serve Willow some pancakes.
“I was thinking today we could take you to get some new furniture for your room,” she said to Sally, her voice clearer than her eyes had been moments before, “There’s a flea market I really love where I bet we could find some gems.”
“Oh, the flea market!” Willow replied excitedly, “Tara’s been promising to take me to the flea market for months.”
“It’s been so busy,” Tara replied apologetically and Willow just smiled and reached over to catch a bit of errant syrup from the corner of Tara’s mouth.
“Isn’t that just other people’s trash?” Sally intoned in a bored voice.
“One person’s trash is another person’s treasure,” Tara smiled knowingly, “I got those glasses you’re drinking out of there.”
Sally almost spit out her orange juice.
“Ew, these are other people’s glasses?”
“We washed them,” Willow replied deadpan, trying to sound mocking as she smiled for Tara, “Well I for one am very excited to go.”
“Yeah, who doesn’t love a trip to the dump,” Sally muttered as she pushed her chair back and walked toward the kitchen.
Tara sighed and Willow bumped Tara’s knee.
“She took her plate to the sink. That’s one win,” she whispered with a smile.
Tara set her silverware on her plate and reached over to cup Willow’s cheek. She leaned in and pressed her lips to Willow.
“I love you more than anything,” she whispered and bumped her nose on Willow’s.
Willow blushed and smiled down at our plate.
“Hey, since it’s our last weekend before school starts, I think we should go all out. The flea market is in Silverlake, right?” she asked and Tara nodded, “Let’s go to Echo Park Lake afterward and do the paddle boats and get some lunch.”
Tara’s upper body physically relaxed.
“That sounds lovely.”
Sally returned and leaned on the back of her chair.
“Or we could go to an arcade and I could whack the mole all the way to Australia.”
She motioned playing the game.
“If you tunneled to the other side of the world from here, you’d be in the middle of the Indian Ocean,” Willow replied knowledgeably, “Just east of Madagascar.”
Sally stopped her whacking and rolled her eyes.
“Madagascar is a movie, dumbass. I’m surprised you don’t remember since you musta played the clown donkey.”
Before Willow could swallow her gulp, Tara brought her hands down on the table.
“Hey,” she said sternly, catching Sally’s eye firmly, “Do not speak to Willow like that. It is not acceptable.”
A silence descended over the table as Tara had never raised her voice to Sally before. She hadn’t really raised her voice now either, but it was so stern that it felt like it.
“Madagascar is a country near Africa. It’s where the animals arrived when they got lost. In the movie,” Willow spoke quietly into the silence before adding on with a low note of haughtiness, “And it was a clown zebra.”
There was a pause of several long breaths before Sally moved for the first time.
“I didn’t know it was a real place,” she said, looking firmly to the floor, “Sounds made up.”
She reached over to grip her opposite arm awkwardly as she glanced up.
“Sorry.”
Willow’s eyebrow rose slightly.
“It’s okay. Thanks for apologizing,” she nodded quickly and stood to break the tension in the air, “Um, maybe we should all go get dressed? The early bird gets the vintage 19th-century cabinets.”
Tara exhaled a last breath and fixed a smile on her face.
“Wouldn’t that be fun, finding something we could upcycle together?”
Willow cocked an eyebrow.
“Especially if you wear a toolbelt.”
“Gross,” Sally said, but had the good grace to mumble it as she marched off into her bedroom.
Tara stood with Willow and wordlessly leaned in for a hug.
Willow rubbed Tara’s back and kissed her cheek.
“It’ll get better. It already is.”
Tara nodded into Willow’s neck. She kissed her there and lifted her head to look at Willow.
“If I get the toolbelt will you get one of those power tools again?” she asked with a crooked smile.
“You want me to drill you?” Willow whispered and Tara hid her blushing face in Willow’s shoulder.
Willow could feel the beaming smile even through her pjs.
“I love you.”
“I love you,” Tara echoed and they hugged again.
Breaking off after a moment, Willow offered to clean up while Tara took the first shower.
While she was drying the last dish, Sally came out dressed for the day and while she had chosen appropriate clothing for the warm day, Willow noticed the back of the soles of her sneakers were flapping.
“Are your shoes broken?” she asked with a frown.
Sally scoffed and rooted her feet to the floor.
“No.”
Willow frowned but tried not to let it show. She was sure she remembered Tara and Sally coming home with a Converse bag a few days ago.
“Didn’t Tara just get you some new ones?” she asked casually, “They might be comfortable to walk around the market in.”
Sally shrugged.
“I’m saving those.”
“For what?” Willow couldn’t hide her confusion this time.
Sally shoved her hands in her pockets uncomfortably.
“For when I need them.”
A lightbulb went off over Willow’s head. She slid the plate in her hands into the cabinet and walked over to the couch Sally was sitting on. She leaned back and tried to adopt an easy tone. She might be very new to a parenting role, but being a self-conscious pre-teen was something she was well-versed in.
“You know, if you wear them and they get worn or damaged or something, that’s okay. We’ll get you new ones whenever you need them. You don’t have to worry about that.”
Sally's brow folded down.
“How’d you guys get so rich?”
“We’re not,” Willow answered, then paused, realizing as she had when she was a kid that that phrase was very relative, “But I guess we do a lot better than other people our age.”
She sat down.
“Tara’s job, the DJing? It pays well because she’s just so amazing you know? And she is, uh, was, uh
is,” she began to gush in reply, “Going through a real booking frenzy right now. And it pays me to be her manager, which is both nuts and extremely fortunate. I also had money left by my grandparents to pay for college. So we’re pretty lucky. And you don’t have to worry. We’ll take care of you.”
Sally’s nose scrunched and she looked at Willow with genuine bafflement.
“Why?”
“Because we want to,” Willow answered simply, leaving off anything too much more sentimental for fear of alienating Sally away from the conversation.
“Because some judge told you,” Sally muttered and Willow saw how her shoulders tightened and eyes fell downward.
“That’s not true,” Willow replied quickly, then took a moment to gather her thoughts as she turned her body toward Sally, “My parents…they weren’t around much growing up. So I hung out with Tara’s family. They became my family.”
She had to bite back any comment about Donny.
“And now you’re a part of that too.”
Sally’s eyes slowly lifted, making a fleeting glance in Willow’s direction as the crease in her brow settled from tension into something softer, more trusting.
“I’m ready.”
Tara appeared from the bedroom and Willow just smiled as she stood, discreetly tapping Sally’s knee.
“‘Kay. I’ll go get dressed and we can head out.”
She kissed Tara’s cheek as she passed to the bathroom. Sally jumped up to run into her room.
“Where are you going so quick?” Tara called out after her, “Do I stink?”
Sally returned with two freshly tied shoelaces. She scrunched her nose again.
“I don’t know what you smell like. I'm not sniffing you.”
“Heaven,” Willow said with a wink.
Tara raised an alluring eyebrow.
“Jews don't believe in heaven.”
“Heaven lives here with me,” Willow countered with the same arch in her brow.
“Jews don't believe in heaven?” Sally asked in surprise.
“Well…it's complicated,” Willow admitted, “You can talk to my Dad about it one day, he'll give you the full low-down. Um, getting dressed now.”
She disappeared into the bedroom.
“You just smell like…I dunno, you,” Sally shrugged as she continued their conversation, then added helpfully, “Sometimes when you come back from work you smell like mozzarella sticks.”
“Great,” Tara replied flatly, “Even pancake batter would be better than that.”
“That’s good because you have some in your hair,” Sally replied with a straight face, then burst out laughing when Tara quickly ran into the bathroom to look in the mirror.
Tara dropped her hands by her sides and let out a soft breath.
“Okay, you got me,” she called out, smiling to herself.
She walked out with her hands on her hips. Sally came up and unexpectedly gave her a giant hug.
Rarely but occasionally there were flashes of the innocence Sally should have at her age and seemed to have been sorely torn from her – and Tara didn’t quite know what to do with them. So she just closed the hug and didn’t try to linger when Sally broke off.
“Cool new kicks!” Willow’s voice came as she arrived in the room, fully dressed.
Sally rolled her eyes which Willow took with a smile as she linked her fingers with Tara’s.
“Are we ready?”
The flea-and-farmers’ market was a straight drive down Santa Monica Boulevard but with weekend morning traffic it was still the best part of an hour before they got there and circled to find a parking space.
“This many people want to buy other people’s junk?” Sally questioned as they finally pulled into a spot.
“Wait until you taste the strawberries in the produce section,” Willow replied as her eyes glazed over, “The first time Tara brought them home she had me eating out of her…”
She glanced at Tara, quickly turning red. She cleared her throat.
“Um, palm. Yes. Good strawberries.”
“I do love the taste of strawberry on my tongue,” Tara replied with a discreet smirk before stepping out of the car and allowing a bit of cool air to hit Willow’s cheeks.
In the backseat, Sally pushed on the window of her seat indignantly.
“I don’t need a stupid child lock.”
Willow got out and let Sally out too.
“It’s not personal, we just can’t find the manual to change it,” she said cheerily, omitting the fact that while that was true, there were endless guides online to do so.
Sally marched on and Tara fell in step with Willow behind her.
“Nice save.”
“Cool as a cucumber, that’s me,” Willow offered a little smile; knowing Tara knew better than anyone how un-cucumber-esque she could be.
Tara bumped Willow’s hip in an acknowledgement of the unspoken thought and they entered through the fencing to the market.
During the week the area was a parking lot for the various office buildings surrounding it, but now there were multiple stalls set up into sections for food, crafts, flowers, and furniture.
“Where do we hit up first?” Willow asked and inhaled deeply as aromas filled the air.
“I’m craving some pastry,” Tara said, her nose twitching similarly.
“And never let it be said that I left a Tara craving unsatisfied,” Willow grinned and raised one eyebrow in Tara’s direction, “Donuts on me!”
Sally looked like she wanted to say something sarcastic but was also wise enough not to jeopardize her donut.
They each picked out a donut from the cart and while Willow and Sally scarfed theirs down in seconds, Tara held hers in her napkin and nibbled at it slowly. Willow saw her drifting toward a setup with lots of old vinyl and called out that she would bring Sally around while Tara browsed.
It was about an hour for them both to do alternate circles of the market and by the time Tara rounded back to the front with some new records to mix and some fresh fruit in her reusable bag, Sally looked positively bored waiting for Willow to finish taking selfies in a new fluffy pink jacket she was wearing.
“Looks like Willow found a purchase,” Tara smiled as she approached and ran her fingers on the soft fluff of Willow’s sleeve, “What about you, Sal? Find anything?”
For a moment, Sally blushed, though she hid it well; adept at hiding her true emotions with larger ones.
“I got this weird giraffe…devil…thing,” she said and thrust a plastic toy in Tara’s face, “It poops candy!”
“Vintage Pez,” Willow chuckled, then quickly frowned, “Don’t eat the candy. We'll get you fresh ones.”
She grabbed the little foil token before any food poisoning could occur.
“Was hoping for more in the way of furniture,” Tara said with a sigh.
“There's some cool beanbags,” Sally replied, “But I don't want one that other people's stinky butts have been on.”
“Tara, I think we have to accept it,” Willow nodded solemnly, “She’s more of an IKEA girl.”
Sally nodded.
“And you can do all the building. You’re just a couple of dykes right?”
If Tara had been playing those vinyls, the needle would have scratched.
It was hard to feel like the air was sucked away when you were standing in the middle of the outdoors, but it still did. The tension and mood of their little spot amongst the hustle and bustle changed so drastically that even Sally suddenly felt like she was sinking into the ground.
“What’d I say?” she asked in a meek voice; a tone unbecoming of her.
Willow snapped to it first and glanced at Tara, who looked like she’d just been slapped. Willow knew, despite everything before and since, that her girlfriend’s visceral reaction to that word was in no small part because of her.
Her eyes fell to Sally, who for the first time wasn’t trying to hide the fact that she was upset.
“Let’s get a hot chocolate and talk,” she tried to break through the rising bubble surrounding them, “Or just with Tara?”
“No,” Tara replied promptly and firmly, “We’re a team now, all of us. Together. So we will discuss this, together.”
A hand went to both Willow and Sally’s backs to turn them around and walk out of the market.
The lake was just down the street from the market so Willow figured out pretty quickly where they were headed. Luckily, since Tara was stonily quiet even when they got to the boat rental place and paid to get them a swan boat.
They sat three in the front with Willow and Tara on either side controlling the padels and Sally in the middle, looking green, though not from seasickness, or lakesickness, as the case may be.
Around them, couples and families were pedaling by, enjoying the hot weather and incredible scenery.
It really was gorgeous; a blue lake with stunning green surrounds, a bird’s eye view of downtown LA, and even a geyser water fountain that shot three cascading blasts of water into the air.
But it was still very much a bubble in the trio’s surrounds.
“Can’t you just yell at me or something?” Sally requested with a scoff as the tension obviously got too much.
“Why do you want us to yell?” Willow frowned and found her own heart start to palpitate just at the sound of her own voice, so caught up she was in the pressure that had encased them.
“It's better than this!” Sally replied and her tone was so broken it pulled Tara back.
Tara inhaled softly but for a very long moment and when she exhaled and turned to face them, her eyes weren’t clouded any longer and her shoulders had released what they were holding onto before.
“We’re not mad at you,” she said softly, looking directly into Sally’s eyes, “But that word…dyke…it’s not a nice word. At least not when it’s meant in a mean way. Trust me, I know.”
Willow winced but quickly swallowed it. Her guilt was resolved and it was definitely not the time to allow herself to baste in insecurity.
Sally went from uncomfortable to perplexed.
“My…dad said it all the time. Doesn’t it mean when two chicks hate men like you guys?”
“We don’t hate men,” Willow interjected quickly with wide eyes.
Sally’s tongue fell out of her mouth with disgust.
“You date guys too?”
Willow began frantically waving her hands back and forth.
“No, no, no!”
Tara reached across and took Willow’s left hand in her right, leaving them clasped in front of Sally.
“Willow and I are gay. A gay woman is a woman who wants to be with other women and well, it's, it's not really so much about hating the men.”
Willow nodded, unable to help a little smirk.
“We're more centered around the…girl-on-girl action.”
Tara shot Willow a look, who quickly reined in her facial muscles.
Sally looked between them, clearly confused.
“The word dyke can be used by nasty people to be an insult,” Tara replied to the unspoken uncertainty.
“That’s not what I meant,” Sally said in a rushed gasp and her sincerity in not wanting to genuinely hurt them, or Tara at least, hit Willow in the heart.
Tara dropped a kiss on top of Sally’s head, who didn’t rebuff the affection.
“It’s not fair that you had people that taught you that the word you used is an okay word to use. That it’s okay to hurt people by saying it.”
Sally looked down at the floor of the boat.
“I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
“We know,” Willow reassured softly.
“We do,” Tara agreed quickly, “Remember I told you to try and use words only if they're kind, necessary, and true? I realized that wasn't fair. At least not all the time. You should be able to say whatever you want to us — Willow and I. And you can. I promise we’ll never be mad if you use words to ask and do not mean it to hurt. I'm not mad now. But I need you to understand when we explain things as well. Like that words like ‘dyke’ and ‘fag’ and sometimes ‘queer’…people who hate people like me and Willow use them to be hurtful. They mean it to be insulting. Kind of like a nickname, you’re not sure if it’s okay to call someone it unless they tell you it’s okay. Have you heard people say ‘that’s so gay’ before?”
Sally nodded.
“What did you think of it?” Tara asked.
Sally shrugged.
“That it meant lame.”
Tara nodded slowly.
“And do you know what gay means? Did you understand my explanation?”
“Yeah,” Sally rolled her eyes a little, “Boys with boys or girls with girls. Like you and Willow. Because… you like each other, not because you don’t like guys? Oh, and you love rainbows!”
“Do you think Willow and I are lame?” Tara questioned.
Willow grimaced.
“I don’t think we want to know the answer to that question.”
“Do you think the fact that Willow and I love each other is lame?” Tara amended with an arched eyebrow.
Sally glanced between them and looked like she was arguing between the devil and the angel on her shoulders.
“Only when you’re sucking face,” she settled on eventually.
She shifted on the seat and looked between them again.
“You’re not lame,” she said, biting on her lip, “I should-a thought about my words more.”
Tara hugged Sally from the side.
“It’s okay that you didn’t know. But now that you do, you have to learn and think about it in the future. Can you do that?”
Sally nodded and returned the hug. Tara smiled over Sally’s shoulder at Willow and opened her arm for Willow to join the hug.
Sally tolerated it for a whole five seconds before breaking free.
“Who’s up for some lunch?” Willow suggested cheerily, feeling a buzz from having gotten through such a rough moment so well.
Sally perked up.
“Can we go back to the market? There was something there I liked.”
“Sure,” Tara smiled and nodded and they began to paddle back to the dock.
A while later they stood at a market stall while the seller went off to make change.
“This is what you wanted?” Tara confirmed.
“I thought it was going to be something mega-chocolatey,” Willow admitted.
“This is what I want. For my wall,” Sally smiled and looked between them with slight uncertainty, “Is that okay?”
Willow grinned.
“You bet, kiddo.”
And so with a little creative swerving, they returned to the car and rode off with a neon rainbow light strapped to the roof safely.
The Dairy Queen they had for lunch was indeed, very chocolatey.