Make Room for Love

by Darcy Liao

There was the barest trace of a smile on Isabel’s face. Mira’s stomach did a flip.

What was it like to move through the world knowing it was your right to take up space?

None of them had set Isabel on fire like this grad student in a cute little sweater talking about labor organizing in Isabel’s living room.

Mira smiled. Yearning tugged at Isabel. She wanted to keep seeing that smile lighting up Mira’s face.

Mira was sincere and kind and determined, and Isabel ached to protect her and see her grow.

Sometimes you had to step up simply because you were there, no matter how inadequate and unprepared you were.

There must be some way Mira loved to be taken care of, some way to make her go from buttoned-up to fully unraveled, flushed and panting⁠—

Mira put more hairline cracks in her composure every day. Now, with this offering, Mira had almost split her open.

“I have feelings for you. And I know that’s my responsibility. I don’t want to cause you any problems.”

Isabel was gorgeous. She was hot. The knowledge hit Mira like a physical blow. All her senses were fully dialed up—keenly, painfully sensitive to all those thick curves under Isabel’s clothes, her quietly radiant smile, the sheer magnetism of her presence. Every passing thought Mira had been too afraid to examine, every flicker of curiosity, every burst of affection, every flare of heat—they all added up to one fact. She wanted Isabel.

She was afraid to look at Isabel. It would be too much like looking at the sun.

Imagining herself with a woman, not suffocating in a man-shaped prison but as herself.

But she knew now that she was a woman who loved other women, and it felt good and right—like coming home to her apartment at the end of a long day.

“Just because you like women doesn’t mean that you have to get married to the first dyke who’s nice to you and knows how to hang shelves.”

Finally, finally, finally—Isabel had found an oasis in the desert, and she’d never drink deeply enough.

“I’m scared, to be honest. I didn’t expect this to happen so soon. But I know I want you.”

“I can’t pretend this didn’t happen and go back to the way things were. I don’t know what this means or what we’re going to do. But I really, really want you. You’re so strong and capable and caring, and I’ve never met anyone like you. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anyone this much.”

Mira nestled her head against Isabel’s shoulder as she was carried across the threshold. This was where she belonged, safe in Isabel’s arms, warm and melty and so, so turned on.

“God, Mira, you’re so fucking gorgeous,” Isabel said,

“You’re so beautiful, Mira,” Isabel said, her breath hot against Mira’s earlobe. “I can’t believe⁠—”

She didn’t say what she wanted to say. My bed is yours. I’m yours. Everything I have is yours. And you’re mine.

It was a refuge from the world telling her that she was too feminine in all the wrong ways or not feminine enough. With Isabel, she could let herself blossom.

Maybe this was what freedom felt like. Months ago, at the start, she’d thought that freedom meant being able to cut and run. It was what she’d needed at the time. But now, finally, she felt free enough to stay—free to choose Isabel, to be with her through the good and the bad, to throw herself into the pain and joy of loving someone even if she didn’t know what was on the other side.

Isabel’s care for her, day in and day out, had changed her life. Mira had grown into the person Isabel had seen in her from the beginning: someone who knew what she wanted and needed, someone who would fight for herself and the people she cared about, someone who listened and spoke out even when she was afraid.

“When something good happens in your life, you know you can just let it happen, right?

“Isabel, I want to stay with you. I want to keep coming home to you, and I want to keep falling asleep next to you and waking up next to you. I want to build a life with you. Not the version of you that’s tough all the time. The real you.”

“I want to keep taking care of you while you’re healing for as long as it takes. I want to keep hearing about Alexa and the rest of your family. I want to know everything you want to tell me.”

Perfect calm settled over Mira. “I love you too, Isabel.”

Mira kissed the top of her head. Isabel had a few premature gray hairs. She was going to be so sexy as she grew older, and Mira wanted to be there for every single day and year and decade of it.

“I’m choosing to trust you,” Mira continued. “All you have to do is trust that I trust you. I’d survive on my own, but I want you to take care of me. And I want to take care of you.”

“I love you, Mira.” Hearing it in Isabel’s utterly straightforward tones, Mira knew it was real. “You made my apartment feel like home again. I thought you were too good to be true.”

“Solidarity forever, for the union makes us strong!”

“You know I’m already yours,” Mira said, pressing their foreheads together. Isabel waited for the rest. “And you’re already mine.”

They’d fall asleep and wake up together. They’d keep waking up with each other, whether in the same bed or apart. They’d keep doing their life’s work and coming home to each other, day after day, year after year. And all Isabel had to do was allow herself to be loved—the hardest and easiest thing in the world. She relaxed against Mira’s warmth, closed her eyes, and let herself rest.