I am so relaxed.

Beyond relaxed.

Somehow, in my twenty-eight years, I have never had a massage before and now I have been shown the error of my ways. Ninety minutes sounded like a drag when Kitty and I lay down on adjacent massage couches in a candlelit room but it flew by, the calming music and skilled hands and warm oil enough to lull me into a state of utter bliss.

The problem with a voucher for a free massage is that it actually involves spending a lot of money, because how could we then say no to a facial treatment and the sauna and a mani pedi?

After four hours in the spa, we have been pampered and preened to within an inch of our lives and I don't think my heart rate has ever been this low before; my skin has never felt so soft and supple. I am detoxed and carefree and my nails look the best they've ever looked. Gone is the chipped nude polish I painted myself over a week ago: I have been buffed and filed and gelled and now my nails are strong and shiny and they match my hair. Is this how rich people feel all the time?

"Face it," Kitty says when we leave the spa just after three o'clock, "that was way better than spending half the day in bed."

"I'll admit, I've never felt so good in my entire life," I say, struggling to contain a yawn. "Although now I'm so relaxed I might have to spend the other half of the day in bed."

"It's like some kind of hypnosis," Kitty says, my yawn setting her off. "We've been lulled into a trance. A state of total relaxation and submission where all we want to do is order more treatments until before we know it, the spa is closed and they tip us into the casino when we're feeling way too good about ourselves and we sink two grand on Blackjack."

To be honest, the way Vegas works, she probably isn't far off with that assumption. But we are too aware to fall victim to their tricks, and we have plans.

Although, when we go back to our room to change, I sit down on the bed to wait for Kitty to do her make-up and I end up lying down, my body sinking into the soft mattress as though I am becoming one with it. Every knot of tension in my body has been loosened and now I am nothing but a pile of ropes, untethered.

"Felicity!"

"Just five minutes," I say, closing my eyes.

"If you fall asleep, I will draw on your face and I have been known to accidentally mix up my eyeliner pencil and my permanent marker," Kitty scolds. "We made plans. We have to stick to them."

We did make plans. On the way down to the spa earlier, I texted Leila to check what she's up to this afternoon, making good on our promise to meet up. She's staying at a small hotel off the Strip, not far from the Neon Museum, and it's on her list of places to check out so we arranged to meet her there at four.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," I say, rolling off the bed and dragging myself to my feet when all my bones want to do is free themselves from their ligaments and make themselves a cozy pile in a sunbeam.

Kitty takes my hand and tugs me to my feet. She can be very forceful when she wants to be. In her words, we have all the time in the world to lounge around in bed (not true, we both have jobs) but we only have two days left in Vegas before we go back to Boston and Leila goes back to Amber Creek (true). Of course I don't want to be late to meet Leila, but on the other hand, it's hard to care when I'm so relaxed.

"Remind me to never let you get a massage again," Kitty says, laughing as she leads the way to the line of yellow cabs outside the hotel.

"Unfortunately for you, the first thing I plan to do once we're home is get a spa membership," I say as we get into a taxi and Kitty gives the address to the driver. "Anxiety? Don't know her."

"Do you have anxiety?" Kitty asks, a note of caution and concern in her voice.

"Not as far as I know," I say, "but this trip has proven to me that I certainly have the potential. Although it's possible I could be confusing anxiety and lovesickness."

"I guess we'll find out, seeing as you have no reason for lovesickness anymore. You got me, Fliss. I'm yours."

*

"I don't want to be weird," Leila says as we walk amongst the old signs from casinos of the past in the Neon Boneyard Main Collection, "especially because our friendship is still very much in its newborn stage, but I don't think I can put into words how over the fucking moon I am that you two saw sense. This"—she points at our joined hands—"is how it's meant to be."

"Face it, Leila, you are weird," I say. "But we like weird."

"Weird is good," Kitty agrees.

"When you told me it was all fake," Leila says, "I thought to myself that's what they think." She taps her temple and gives us a knowing look and I have to laugh. "Call me arrogant or deluded, but I like to think I played a part in this coming together."

"You did," I say. We pause to take photos of the giant discarded signs, bulb-filled letters taller than us. It's eerie, kind of unsettling. Like an abandoned funfair. A graveyard of vintage neon.

"I did?"

"You planted the seeds. Or, I guess, you watered the seeds that were hiding under the soil."

"I do love a good analogy," Leila says. Kitty chuckles.

"You were there at the right time," I add. "You're the one who made me see that maybe Kitty wasn't acting, and maybe she wasn't straight."

"Correct on both counts," Kitty says.

"I already know your truth," Leila says to me. She turns to Kitty and asks, "When did you realize?"

"That I love Fliss?"

"Yeah."

Kitty's lips twitch. "I guess it was when the guy I was about to walk down the aisle with said what the hell are we doing getting married when you've been in love with your best friend since before we even met?"

Leila is caught between a swoon and a laugh. "Does he know he was right?"

"No. I should tell him."

"I should probably let Sally know," I say. "She hit the nail on the head. She was so sure this would work and I couldn't see a way I wouldn't end up with my heart broken. Somehow it's even less broken than it was before."

"Oh my god, stop." Leila's grinning from ear to ear. "Now let me take your pictures. This place is so aesthetic. We need to do a photoshoot."

*

We're there for over an hour, until the light starts to fade and we have taken photos of and with every sign in the boneyard. Judging by the ease with which Leila directed our impromptu photoshoot, she may be more of a Fliss than I first thought. She's a natural behind the camera, shying away when I turn it on her.

The Fremont Street Experience is a fifteen minute walk from the Neon Museum and it's a balmy seventy-one degrees as we wander down Las Vegas Boulevard North until we reach the Heart Attack Grill, where a bunch of giggly drunk women are taking it in turns on the giant scale. Anyone over three hundred and fifty pounds eats free. All of them are under a hundred twenty, even fully dressed. I will not be getting on that thing.

It's definitely worth waiting until night. Fremont Street is a cornucopia of light and activity and the buzz of people, the noise of live shows and the shrieks of people on the zipline overhead. It's a lot, enough to tip me into overstimulation on a regular today, but today is not a regular day. Today I am carefree without even having had a drop to drink, the result of a joint effort from the spa and Kitty's love, and I eat it up.

We watch a free show. I take a video when Kitty and Leila go on the Slotzilla zipline, a nauseating eleven stories high and the entire length of Fremont Street. I feel funny just watching them fly down the line at forty miles an hour, and Kitty knows better than to try to persuade me to get on that. Never mind the fact that I think I'd be uncomfortably close to the weight limit, nothing could get me to sail parallel to the ground over a hundred feet in the air attached to nothing but a few straps.

Other than that, I throw myself into everything Fremont Street has to offer, from watching the Sigma Derby races at The D and watching the Viva Vision light show to taking our chances on the free slots outside Binion's and, inside, we get a picture with a million dollars in cash. We eat at Le Thai, where the short rib fried rice and the waterfall sauce are borderline life changing experiences – the kind of food so fucking amazing I just know that someday in five years' time I'll wake up craving it – and we get doughnuts from Pinkbox, and I am still high on life at almost eleven p.m. as we walk Leila back to her hotel.

"Thank you for tonight. This was epic," she says, pulling us both into a tight hug. "The offer stands, you know, if you ever do make it all the way out to Washington." She does jazz hands. "Amber Creek welcomes you and so do I."

"We've got your number," I say. "If Kitty can stand me for a whole year, we'll have to see about that anniversary trip."

"If I've been able to stand you for the last decade," Kitty interjects, "I think we can handle one more year."

"Don't jinx it. We're sailing headfirst into the unknown. What if it turns out we're wildly sexually incompatible?"

Kitty laughs and says, "I'd never know, seeing as that's true of every relationship I've ever been in."

"I think we can turn that around."

Leila holds up both hands and says, "This is my cue to leave, but I wish you all the best in your, uh, sexual endeavors."

Kitty bows. "Much appreciated, my friend."

"Seriously, though. You guys turned this trip around for me, so thank you. A million times, thank you. I owe you a big one." She presses her hands together as though in prayer, her eyes shining.

"Come here, you big softie." I wrap her in a tight hug, my eyes stinging. In only a few days, she's managed to make a big impact on me, and this may not be our last day in the city but I don't know if we'll see each other again for a long time.

After a prolonged goodbye, Leila heads up to her room and Kitty orders us an Uber, and I use the fifteen minute drive to text Sally.

i will never doubt you again, my wise salamander friend, I say. It's two in the morning in Boston so I don't expect a reply, but I guess Sally's making the most of her Friday night because only a minute passes before she sees my text.

wtf are you drunk?

drunk on love, I say. I send her one of the many pictures I have of Kitty and me and I add, you were right, everything is okay. more than okay. it's fucking fantastic

Oh my GOD Fliss!!!, Sally says. give a gal a warning! I just yelled so loud i probably woke up all my kids

it's 2am on a saturday and all your kids are teenage boys, i guarantee none of them were asleep lol. why are YOU not asleep

Once in a blue moon date night with Richard, she replies.

very late date night, I say.

Turns out we've still got it in us after all, she says, followed by a few winky faces.

congrats on your biannual orgasm!

Sally sends a string of laughing emojis before she says, never mind mine ... go get yours.

*

We have been here for almost two weeks and we have yet to try out the rooftop pool.

That's about to change, though. It's open until one a.m. tonight and my post-spa exhaustion has been replaced with the invigoration that follows a fun night. I'm not ready to go straight to bed and neither is Kitty.

"You can't wear that," she says when I come out of the bathroom in my favorite one piece bathing suit.

"What's wrong with it?" I look down in case there's a stain I missed.

"The roof pool is top-optional," she says, "and I want the option of taking your top off."

"I am not taking my top off in public," I say, though the way she says it gets me flustered, the idea of Kitty undressing me.

"We're out of season and this hotel is pretty quiet anyway. Half the time we're virtually the only ones in the lazy river during the day. I bet there's hardly anyone up there." She toys with the strings of her top. "I know you packed a bikini, and I know you look hot as fuck in it."

I bought it in a rare moment of boldness under Kitty's guidance after she invited me on this trip. The top is sturdy with thick straps and the high-waisted bottoms come up above my belly button, smoothing out my stomach but exposing every inch of my thighs. My instinct screams no no no, but Kitty's eyes say please, and I melt.

I grab it from my case and return to the bathroom to try it on. The tropical print is bold and fun and the padded cups of the top make my boobs look bigger than they are, but the legs are high cut, showing off so much more skin than I'm used to.

Kitty knocks on the door. "Can I come in?"

"Yup."

She pokes her head into the bathroom and her eyes darken as she takes me in from head to toe, her gaze lingering on my chest. "Fuck," she says, her voice low. "That's the one. You are not taking that off. Although I kinda wanna take it off you."

"You like this?" Her stare gives me a boost. I turn and pose, sticking my butt out. Kitty nods mutely. I take her speechlessness as a good side and I kiss her parted lips. "Let's go see what this pool is all about, then."

*

She's right. It's surprisingly quiet for a late night pool in Las Vegas, no more than twenty people on the deck, a handful in the water and a few at the bar. This is the first day I haven't had a drink while we've been here and I don't feel the need. If anything happens tonight, I want to be sober for it, even though the frozen pina coladas are calling my name.

Several palm trees line two sides of the pool and beyond the edge of the roof I can the bright lights of Vegas at night, the Wynn and the Encore and The Palazzo at the Venetian. We're far from the buzz, though; there's a chilled-out atmosphere up here. This is not one of Vegas's party pools

"Oh no," Kitty says. "We've been missing out."

"It's only open this late on the weekends. We haven't missed too much."

None of the semi-submerged beds in the shallow end are free, but a minute after we arrive, a couple of guys start folding their towels and looking for their shoes and I snag it the moment they leave. My self-consciousness over wearing a bikini slowly dissipates when I realize that nobody's looking at us, nobody cares. I sit on the edge of the bed with my feet swinging in the lukewarm water. Kitty, ever bolder than me, launches herself straight into the deep end with a splash and swims the entire length underwater until she emerges at the foot of the bed and wraps her hands around my ankles.

"Come in. The water's perfect," she says, tugging my feet. I scoot to the edge of the bed and lower myself to the ledge it's sitting on, submerged in a few inches of water, before I slip into the pool. It's deliciously cool in the Vegas humidity. I float on my back, staring up at the sky, and I can't see the stars thanks to the light pollution but I know they're there. Kitty floats next to me, our hands entwined, until some douchebag jumps in way too close and splashes us, and we both end up flailing and choking on chlorinated water.

We end up against the side of the pool, where the water is four feet deep and we can easily stand. Kitty's back is against the tiles, my hands either side of her and my lips on hers. Under the water, her thighs are trapped between mine, my body holding her in place as I kiss her. My glasses are in my bag but I can see her just fine when we're this close, close enough that I can see the beads of pool water clinging to her eyelashes, the shine of her damp cheeks, the depth of her pupils.

"I know it's soon," I say, "but I can't stop thinking about what you said."

"I've said a lot of stuff," Kitty says, her words barely more than a breath. Her cheeks are flushed, her eyes wide, an innocence in her expression.

"No-one's ever made you come," I say. Her breath hitches. My hands float for a moment before they find her waist, her soft flesh yielding under my touch.

"Sad but true." She stares at me, her lips slowly parting.

"I don't want to brag, but I'm pretty sure I can give you what you want. What you need." I may not have had a girlfriend before but I've had flings with women, a handful of one night stands. I know how women work. I know what I like, and I know Kitty. I trust her. She trusts me. That's half the battle.

"I'd like for you to try." She's barely even whispering now.

"If it's too fast, just tell me. Everything we do is on your terms," I say, her adoring gaze egging me on and giving me the confidence to say what I say next: "I would really, really like to fuck you, Kitty Cohen. I want to make you come."

I don't say that I really need to come, too. It's been two weeks since I last touched myself and I need the release.

"I want you to fuck me," Kitty says. Hearing her say that word in this context does something to my head. I almost groan out loud, pressing closer to her. My hands slip from her waist to her hips and I pull her bottom lip between my teeth, my nose pressed into her cheek as I slowly kiss her. Before this trip, I would've laughed at the idea of Kitty and me ending up in this situation together. Now it takes every ounce of control not to move my hand between her legs and push aside her bikini bottoms right here.

"I don't know if you can make me come, though," she says, already breathing hard. "I don't even know if I can, with someone else."

My fingertips skim her thighs. We need to get out of the pool before security kicks us out. But first, I nip her earlobe and whisper, "You have never come with someone else because you're a lesbian who has only ever slept with men."

She lets out a breathy laugh in my ear. Every nerve in my body is on fire. "I really don't know what I'm doing," she says.

"Me neither. This is uncharted territory."

"You've slept with women before, though."

"Yeah. But none of them were you," I say. "They were hook-ups. I've never slept with a woman I love." My voice hitches on the last word. "But we'll do what we always do." My lips sink to her neck. Who knew chlorinated skin could taste so good?

"What's that?"

"Figure it out together."

*

when the slow burn finally starts burning ;) caution: the next chapter contains scenes of a sexual nature!