Chapter 13

Claire’s turn:

I was rummaging through our toiletries, again, when I caught motion in the mirror and saw Charley come up behind me. She wrapped her arms around me from behind and gave me a hug before tugging me out of the bathroom and into the bedroom. After turning me around, she pushed me back onto the bed and got up to straddle my waist. Putting her hands on either side of my face, she leaned over and kissed me tenderly.

“Love, you’re freaking out,” she said. “We use the same things, and I’ve already packed them for both of us. You know that, right?” I nodded, sheepishly. “Do you trust me?”

I reached up and pulled her head down to give her a kiss before answering. “I trust you with my life, with everything. I know you’ve got it under control, but I’m nervous, and I guess this is my version of fidgeting.”

She smiled, then leaned down and kissed the tip of my nose. “That’s fine, really it is, but you still need to get dressed and off to school. Don’t worry, I’ll have everything ready when I pick you up at school. Just be in the office by 12:30, and we’ll head out from there. The only things we haven’t already packed are our dresses for Friday night, and they won’t take long. I just don’t want them tucked into a bag for longer than necessary.” Then she started kissing me deeply and rubbing her breasts against mine.

When she came up for air, I said, “That is so not the way to get me out the door for school, and you know it!”

She grinned, scooted down to kiss each breast, then hopped off and pulled me up. “I’ll bet you think about me all day, though.”

“You don’t need to do that to make me think about you — I do that every day. All you’re doing is making sure my panties will be soaked.”

She laughed, then leaned forward and nipped my right nipple! The jolt from that caused my breath to catch, and left me a little wobbly, but she just went to get breakfast ready while I finished getting ready.

Charley had come a long way from joking about whether she could grill hot dogs. One thing she’d worked on was a nice, stuffed omelette, the type that Grandma called ‘country-style’. This time she filled it with ham, onion and mushrooms that she must have cooked up before coming to get me.

As I was eating, she said, “I’ll also bring a lunch you can eat on the drive since it’ll be late before we get down there, and Steve and Tina want to take us to dinner.”

After I finished breakfast, I saw I had a little extra time, so I grabbed Charley and set her on the counter before pulling her panties off and diving in under her long T-shirt. Ignoring her half-hearted protests, I licked and teased her until she was panting. Then I stood up.

“Sorry, I need to get to school!” I said before hurrying to collect my rain gear and head out the door, with her laughing imprecations goading me on. Fair’s fair, I thought as I licked my lips — if my panties were going to be wet, hers were, too.

I was still grinning when I got to school. I saw Jane first thing, and went up to say hello, since I’d be missing lunch and our classes together. After I gave her a quick hug, she gave me an odd look. Then she sniffed.

She winked at me, then leaned in and whispered, “You need to go wash your face.”

I was still blushing when I made it to homeroom. Trish saw me and said, “Wow! That’s quite the blush.”

No, that didn’t help anything. I told her to ask Jane about it at lunch.

At 12:25, my phone buzzed to let me know I had a message. It was Charley, telling me she’d already signed me out and was waiting out front. When I got there, she gave me a big kiss right there in the parking lot, then another after I was buckled in.

“You’ll like this one,” I said once we’d made our way out of town, headed south. “I, uh, left home in a bit of a hurry this morning and forgot to wash my face.”

She playfully slapped my leg. “You left me so frustrated. You need to make that up to me.”

I grinned and reached over to her lap, but she knocked my hand away. “Don’t even think about it, love. We don’t want to crash, and I can’t promise to pay attention to anything but you when you’re doing that. Anyway, you were saying something about forgetting to wash your face?”

“Right. When I got to school, I saw Jane and gave her a hug. Guess what she smelled?”

She chuckled, then said, “What in the world am I going to do with you? Now I’ll be embarrassed the next time I see her. That’s not nice.”

“You think you’re embarrassed? I was still blushing when I got to homeroom and Trish noticed. Oh, and I hope you realize that you’re going to need to make it up to me for giving me damp panties all day.”

Later, as we were starting our way north from Tacoma to the airport, Charley asked me if I had everything ready for screening.

“I think so,” I said. “My computer and iPad are ready to take out, my student ID is ready, my keys and phone are accessible and the only metal on my body are my rings.”

She nodded and said, “Good. I hate TSA screening, but they have a job to do, and it’s easiest to just let them get on with it. Do you have your copies in your bag?”

“Always,” I said. “Our marriage certificate and waiver go with me everywhere.”

It took a while to get through the TSA queue, but I eventually got to the front.

“Who is the adult with whom you are traveling,” she asked after checking my ID and finding I was fifteen.

“The woman who just went through the line, the short one with black hair? She’s my wife.”

“Your wife?”

I winced at her tone. It was easy to forget how it would look when so many people around home knew about us.

I nodded to her, then said, “It’s all legal. I have copies of our marriage certificate and the Judge Smith’s minimum age waiver in my bag if you’d like to see them.”

The documents were produced and examined, her supervisor was called in, airport security was called in — what a mess. It wasn’t quick, but eventually they decided the documents were legitimate.

After it was all cleared up, the TSA supervisor took us aside. “I understand that this put a kink in your day, and I apologize for that. I hope you realize, though, that we’re doing our best, and one of the things we keep an eye out for is traffickers. Your situation was new to us, so we felt the need to be sure.”

Charley smiled at him and said, “Thanks for explaining. Is there anything, other than lying about our relationship, that we can do in the future to ease the way? We’re coming back from Orange County on Sunday, and it’d be nice if we could get it cleared up quicker.”

“Well, we’ve documented your case here, so it won’t be an issue next time you come through SeaTac. In general, you could try just not volunteering the information about your relationship, just say, ‘I’m with her’ or something like that. I’ll also let the office down there know about you, so they’ll at least have some idea that you’re coming through.”

We thanked him and headed off to our gate, glad that Charley had left us plenty of time to go through security. We were both still a little frazzled when we got there, but we could finally try to relax. Charley was more used to the bustle and noise, so she calmed down first. When she noticed I was still having problems, she reached up and pulled me down for a kiss, then started stroking my arm in a gentle, calming gesture.

“Deep breaths, sweetie, deep breaths,” she quietly said. “For the moment, just try to tune out everything else and relax.”

I closed my eyes and worked to focus on my breathing, letting all the sounds surrounding me pass unnoticed. It worked right up until someone nearby harshly said, “Your vile lifestyle has condemned you to Hell! Begone, and never show your faces in public again!”

I opened my eyes just as Charley calmly said, “My lifestyle is none of your concern. We’re not going anywhere until our flight leaves.”

He started to draw his arm up like he was going to hit her, so I jumped between them and shouted, “Don’t you dare hit my wife, asshole!”

The suddenness of my motion must have surprised him because he stumbled back. By the time he started to move forward again, though, we had quite the audience and the security people were heading our way.

I hoped that would end it, but he began shouting that we were vile sinners and demanding that Alaska kick us off the flight and that we be arrested. There went any chance of relaxation. At least the distraction kept me from obsessing about the flight. In the end, we weren’t the ones still on the ground when the plane took off for Orange County.