Before Ally there was Hailey. Before Hailey there was nothing much for Paige. Just a couple of boys who had been willing to try, and who gave Paige the chance to see if this sex thing was all it was cracked up to be. If her experience up to point where Hailey changed everything were the only evidence she were to ever collect on the subject of sex, Paige would've had only one possible conclusion to offer: not really. Not even close to satisfying.

It wasn't that she wasn't into sex with boys. She was definitely into that, but her boyfriends had not really been into it quite as much as she was. She would eventually learn that this was more their problem than hers, but at the time she had absolutely no way of knowing that.

And it wasn't that they didn't try. It was more because they had no idea what it took to make a girl happy in bed. To be fair, both of her boyfriends were about as experienced as she was up to that point. Well, almost. Her second boyfriend technically had even less considering he was still a virgin when Paige was going out with him.

She could've had much more experience Paige was definitely not a late bloomer. From middle school she was considered one of the cutest girls in her class and, consequently, a constant target of offers for everything from simple dates to the more crass and obscene from boys often too old and always far too low brow to arouse her interests.

In a lot of ways, those types and their abundance at her high school were a major factor in her shyness towards the idea of intimacy. The other factor was an restrictive home environment that would've stifled just about any normal person with its wonderful mix of extreme religious sentiment, anti-sexual fervor, and a ban on anything deemed offensive.

The restrictiveness came from her mother, a woman who was very serious about her interpretation of the Holy Bible much to the frustration of Paige's father who was religious in his own way. But he thought he'd married a woman who believed in a loving, kind god who taught peace, love and forgiveness. Instead, she turned out to be a psycho conservative who believed a vengeful god. She was pro-censorship, commanded his children to go to church whenever it's doors were unlocked, believed in sex for procreation only, and thought that everything from MTV to football on Sundays was an unforgivable sin.

Actually, he had married the first woman and not the second but, after Paige's older brother had died of a rare genetic condition only a year after Paige was born, his wife had changed and it was not for the better. Paige had been too young to remember what that woman whom she called her mother was like before, but she could attest to the fact that the woman who raised her until she entered middle school was a psychotic, paranoid mess of repression who did a great job of instilling her repressed attitudes in her daughter.

When her parents got divorced she went through the usual painful emotions. Many were caused by her mother's wholesale rejection of the idea of joint custody. She forced Paige's Dad to seek full custody and prolonged the divorce proceedings for far too long out of spite and very unchristian-like vengeance. The pain faded quite rapidly when her father remarried a nice, kind, and understanding woman. It may have taken Paige awhile to call Cindy Mom, but she still loved her and learned that it was normal to do so. This was much better than walking on eggshells to avoid causing a meltdown of biblical proportions, which was the relationship she had with her real mother.

She may have not have been all that motherly, but Cindy was Paige's first real friend at a time when she really needed one. It was thanks to Cindy, though somewhat indirectly, that Paige ended up having sex at all and (much more directly) that Paige ended up joining the cheerleading squad.

It was cheerleading that changed so much for Paige in ways she couldn't have possibly imagined, as well as in more simple ways. It gave Paige the necessary boost in confidence to actual step out of the shell she'd developed with the help of her mother and actually try some things she'd been dying to try. Some of those things Cindy wouldn't have been too proud to be connected with, but given the likely alternative she probably would've thought the way it turned out was much better.

Not that Paige would know or ever think to tell Cindy so she could know. She may have considered Cindy a friend, but she was smart enough to realize there was a natural limit to their friendship; a place where the friendship ended and Stepmother began. Smoking pot, having sex, and getting drunk at weekend sleepovers were not Cindy conversation material. Dating boys, having fun at weekend sleepovers, the finer points of buying cute clothes, applying makeup so it straddled the fine line between conservatively tasteful and daringly slutty, and the less specific aspects of sex were Cindy's area of expertise.

Of course, when Cindy first entered Paige and her Father's life, most of those weren't an issue. Paige's innocence remained pretty much intact until the latter half of high school. She did date boys in middle school and freshman year, but none of it really amounted to anything. Some sloppy, awkward kissing and some half hazard boob groping was about all any of it ever amounted to.

And, yes, she sipped her share of beer and even tried smoking a cigarette once, but she was far too young to really get into any of that until high school and then not until she was near the end of it. No, for the most part Paige was an innocent, suburban girl who had heard of many more things then she'd actually ever done. Some of what she'd heard scared the crap out of her or, at least, confused her more than it made her curious.

However, the confusion didn't stop Cindy from being the subject of Paige's first official girl crush. And not just a cute, innocent girly girl crush. No, Cindy was the focus of many of Paige's early masturbation sessions. The embarrassment of this actually helped cool their relationship for awhile during Paige's early adolescence, but Cindy's friendliness always broke through. Then Paige met her first real boyfriend and for awhile the awkwardness faded as Cindy became less and less of an obsession.

Still, the obsession with girls in general always came back when Paige wasn't involved with a boy. At that age Paige wasn't sure to make of these feelings. She was too young to quite get the concept of gay, straight or bisexual. Even if she had understood them it wouldn't have helped, because her friends at the time weren't exactly bragging about their own experimentations. She would later realize she was not the first girl to have those feelings let alone the first to be confused by them.

So she suffered in silence, secretly ashamed of her desires. Not just her desire for Cindy, which faded eventually thanks to repression, but also for several other girls and woman. Many would've been shocked to discover that innocent, little Paige, who went to church every Sunday and youth group every Tuesday and even occasionally volunteered for her church's ultra-conservative anti-Halloween house of horrors, secretly wanted nothing more than to discover what it was like to share the love that dare not speak its name with them.

Sometimes Paige honestly and truly thought she was an evil sinner who would burn in hell for all eternity for her sinful, disgusting desires. Other times she wished that once, just once she could've had the courage to find out for herself what it felt like to be with another girl in the most intimate of fashions. She allowed her first boyfriend to take her virginity in the hopes that it would rid her of her horribly beautiful fantasies, but to no avail. As much as she liked her boyfriend and eventually came to enjoy having sex with him, it never caused the feelings she had for other girls to vanish completely.

At best the sex was a distraction. At worst it wasn't even that. Sometimes she couldn't even get off with her boyfriend unless she concentrated and imagined that it was whatever girl was occupying her thoughts at that particular time making love to her. Considering her boyfriend's inexperience, this happened quite often. It was the main reason she broke up with him.

Her second boyfriend, also a virgin, had at least been experienced enough to know how to make Paige come on a fairly regular basis, mainly with his fingers, but eventually he became good enough with his mouth to get her off that way as well. Still, all he did was make it easier for Paige to imagine it was really a girl going down on her or fingering her pussy when those thoughts began to overwhelm her.

It wouldn't be until college before Paige came across any boys capable of performing well enough in bed to make her enjoy having sex with them entirely on its own merits, but even then it was only almost all of the time. It was a problem; one she had no idea how to go about fixing.

It wasn't that she was gay or anything. At least, she was pretty sure she wasn't. By the time she hit high school and knew what the word meant she tended to think of herself as bisexual. She liked guys. She was honestly and truly attracted to them, but they just couldn't satisfy all of her needs and could do nothing to satisfy her curiosity about what it was like to be with a girl.

Near the end of her time in high school Paige would finally find a girl who was willing to show her what she was missing and, more importantly, was willing to take command of the situation and make it happen despite Paige's innate shyness. Paige's life would be changed forever and her craving for the brand of sex and love that could only be found with another girl would become that much more potent.

The girl's name was Hailey. She and Paige had known each other ever since middle school. They hadn't exactly been friends for most of that time. In fact, they hadn't really hung out at all until their sophomore years in high school when Hailey, on a whim, joined the cheerleading team which Paige had been on her entire time in high school.

At first Hailey was just another girl on the team. All through sophomore year the two girls barely interacted. It wasn't until cheer camp during the summer between sophomore and junior years that they became friends.

Cheer camp was a mixed blessing. During the day they'd work their asses off and at night a fair number of the girls would find places to hide and pass around joints or get drunk. The others slept and the coach would be off in the neighboring town fucking her boyfriend, not making it back to camp until four in the morning. Sometimes the coach wouldn't even show up until after the team had been up for awhile. They'd all get an extra long break before they started conditioning and practicing throwing and other fun stuff they'd rather not be doing in the middle of summer out in an open field with the sun beating down like god's own wrath. That was probably the only reason why Paige hadn't partaken in the more bawdy aspects of cheer camp until she and Hailey became good friends. She was generally too beat to even consider doing anything besides take a shower and go to bed.

Once she started hanging out with Hailey, that changed. The clearing in the woods they went to at night was a place they'd discovered the year before with couple of their closer friends on the team and had kept secret because, as Hailey said, it was cooler if it was a secret.

It was a pretty neat little spot. It was close enough to the camp that it was impossible to get lost even when they were a little buzzed, but far enough and separated by enough trees, that they could take flashlights with them with them so they could see what they were doing without alerting everyone in the camp to where they were. That would've been bad considering why they went there in the first place: namely, to smoke weed.

Or, at least, that's why Paige thought they went there even though when they first found it she didn't smoke anything. She just hung out with Hailey and their friends and laughed at them while they got stoned. She'd only gone with them a couple of times because she was too bored to fall asleep despite how tired she was physically. She was about to find out that a whole lot more went on there the times they'd gone without her. It was going to be a very special and extremely enlightening night.

But it was already supposed to be. It was the night that Paige was going to lose her "weed cherry"as Hailey had so colorfully put it. Paige was sick of being the only sober one in the group. Well, that and it looked like fun to her. Sure, her friends were absolute morons when stoned, but they were happy morons. After breaking up with her boyfriend only a week before cheer camp, plus all the other stress in her life, she really couldn't see a downside to being a happy moron for awhile.

Besides, after a year of listening to Hailey talk about how awesome pot was, Paige's wall was finally crumbling down. She would've smoked it with Hailey earlier, but Hailey insisted that they wait for cheer camp because Paige would appreciate it more. At the time Paige had assumed she meant it in the after a hard day of getting sweaty and sore kind of way, but she eventually found out that was completely wrong.

It all started to seem a little weird to Paige. Hailey insisted that Paige not invite anyone else that night. When pressed, Hailey only said, "Because I said so. What you don't wanna hang out with me?" She was kidding, of course, but it was enough to kill any further attempts by Paige to question her. Besides, Paige really didn't mind spending time alone with Hailey. She was deep in a serious crush on Hailey and had been for awhile. She was under the delusion that Hailey had no idea.

There was also something else Paige didn't know: the feeling was mutual and had been for a very long time. In fact, that had been the reason Hailey became friends with Paige and joined the cheerleading squad. Unlike Paige, Hailey had almost always known where she fell on the sexual spectrum. She was gay. Not bi, not curious, not confused or crazy, but gay. From the moment she knew what the word meant she knew it applied to her.

And it wasn't because she hated men. She just loved women. Guys were okay as friends, but that penis thing? She had zero interest in it. In fact, she kind of found it revolting. She'd never seriously considered having sex with boys and she couldn't imagine a scenario where she would.

Women, though, were another story. Ever since she'd talked a friend into letting her go down on her at a slumber party in middle school, Hailey had known that it was meant to be and she hadn't stopped. Sadly, she'd never really had a girlfriend, but she up made for that by being a very cunning and capable seductress of innocent, curious schoolmates. She achieved this "success" by being blessed with excellent gaydar (or bi-dar or experimental-dar if you want to be ultra specific and somewhat annoying about it) and being extremely patient with her potential lovers.

Numbers wise she had a fairly substantial toll, but she didn't look at it like that. It was mainly a byproduct of her environment that she had to settle for quantity over quality. The town she and Paige lived in was a fairly conservative suburban hellhole. Coming out in high school, even as bi, which was somewhat respectable in certain circles, wasn't something a lot of girls were willing to do. At least not the girls Hailey generally found herself attracted to.

Sure, there were a few girls who were openly gay, but, they just weren't Hailey's type at all. They were all, invariably, really butch and she just wasn't into that. She liked the femmes. Most of the femmes she managed to win over turned out to be a little skittish about ruining their reps or eventually went back to guys when they'd had their fun with Hailey.

That had changed for awhile when she became a cheerleader. The girl she was chasing when she became a cheerleader was actually, for once, gay. Of course, she was also deep in the closet and therefore while they were going out no one was allowed to know. But for a few months it was absolute bliss. To the outside world it appeared that they were just really close friends who happened to spend a lot of time having sleepovers and hanging out by themselves. However, there was a lot more going on behind closed doors.

At least there was until one night at her girlfriend's house they'd forgotten to lock the door and were caught in a precarious position (commonly known as a sixty nine) by her girlfriends stepmother. It was all over a month later when her girlfriend transferred to a school halfway across the state and went to live with her mother. It had been an incredibly tough time for Hailey. Especially since her girlfriend, Emma, had sworn her to secrecy over the phone the last time they talked. She spent her nights crying herself to sleep while trying hard to appear no sadder than anyone else that Emma had left so abruptly.

The only good thing to come out of it was the realization that her mother was not the homophobe Hailey thought she was. Her dad, however, was a different story. Luckily, he'd been out of town on business when Emma's parents freaked and made their phone calls, so he never found out. Well, not until after she went to college and came back with a girlfriend, but that was still a long way off at that point. Still, it was good to know that at least one of her parents didn't hate her for something that was beyond her control.

After that Hailey went back to her old ways with a vengeance, but she found those ways less appealing then she remembered. Sex for fun just couldn't hold a candle to making love. Still, she did it—partially to hide her pain and partially because of the secret hope that she'd find Miss Right somehow in a sea of straight girls. So far, she hadn't had much luck. Sure, she'd found some fun playmates, but that was it and it was no longer enough.

Then she noticed Paige. There was something about her that drew her attention. In fact, there had always been something about Paige that called to her. Exactly what she had no idea, but it was there and felt oh so familiar. It took her awhile to figure it out, but once she did it amazed her that it had eluded her for so long, but there it was: Paige was into girls.

Hailey had no idea how she knew, but she was absolutely sure. Having good gaydar doesn't mean you always understand how it works. Maybe it was the way Paige's eyes seemed to linger just a wee bit longer than most straight girls would when she was scanning a female friend or a stranger with an attractive physique. Maybe it was a slight hint of flirtation that escaped Paige at times that maybe even Paige wasn't aware of. Seriously, Hailey had no idea, but there was something there. She was absolutely sure of it.

Hailey had noticed it about the same time she and Emma had started their clandestine affair, but as that got serious in a rapid fashion she'd kind of let it go. She did start to initiate a friendly relationship with Paige after that, just in case the usual happened with Emma. When it didn't, she didn't abandon her friendly overtures just because she was longer interested in trying to get Paige in bed. No, she kept it up and quickly discovered Paige, while a bit closed off in odd ways that made sense once you knew her background, was actually a pretty fun person to be around.

Hailey actually allowed herself to become such a close friend that for awhile, even after Emma left and it had stopped hurting as much as it had and she'd learned to repress it as much as possible, she couldn't bring herself to making a move on Paige for fear of ruining a good friendship. Beside, in the meantime Paige had found herself a boyfriend and seemed pretty happy with the bastard. Hailey was gay. She wasn't a bitch.

Then Paige became single again. Also, there was the little fact that Hailey had become aware that Paige was attracted to her. Not just curious in a general sense, but attracted in a very specific way to Hailey herself.

Hailey had realized this slowly and gathered her evidence before deciding whether or not she was willing to risk their friendship to find out if she was wrong or not. By the time she'd finished analyzing the signals she was absolutely certain she was correct and that it was totally worth the risk.

What were the signals? Well, some were rather subtle, but others were quite obvious, so obvious that Hailey began to wonder how she missed them. The less subtle ones were enough, but it was the blatant one that was damning, but, honestly, she was a bit ashamed of it. With all the subtle signs and suspicious little idiosyncrasies Hailey simply had to do it no matter how wrong and evil it may have been.

She read Paige's diary and there was plenty in it about her and many, many other girls and women. Even Hailey's Emma. And several other members of the cheer team. And Paige's step mom which Hailey could definitely sympathize with because Cindy was both awesome and hot. Sadly, no vibes though otherwise Hailey probably would've tried with her. Why not? She'd done it once before and it had been freaking amazing if only a one time thing, but that's another story.

But it wasn't just names. It was fantasies and dreams and frustrations written out in very telling detail and it was damning, but it was the best thing Hailey had read in a long time. It was also disheartening in a way. There Paige was, to the outside world this funny, but very private, beautiful girl who gave only the smallest, tiniest hints that there might be something else beneath the surface while deep inside she was raging cauldron of desire just waiting to explode.

Had Hailey been an idiot she would've tried right then and there to seduce her friend, but at that point she knew exactly what she was dealing with. It wasn't like she could just say "Oh, hey. I read your diary. Wanna do it?" No, she had to work her way in. Especially since Paige apparently had no idea Hailey was even gay and, as she already knew from watching how Paige dealt with guys, Paige was a hard nut to crack.

And that was the whole reason for them being alone. It was the only way to let Paige know that they were both on the same page without letting the whole world know. Not that it had to be at cheer camp, but frankly even Hailey could be nervous when a good friendship was on the line.

So, there they were, alone in the woods smoking Paige's first joint and Hailey's god only knew when Hailey figured that it was as good a time as any to let Paige know she wasn't the only girl in that woods that was attracted to other girls.

"God, did you see the ass on the girl from Westwood?" Hailey asked. Paige stared at her blankly, not knowing if she'd heard that quite right thanks to the smoke that was now clouding her brain. Hailey continued as if it was a rhetorical question, "I'd fuck the hell out of that girl."

With that Paige choked on the hit she'd been holding and coughed so hard she almost puked, but managed to save herself that little indignity by pure luck. Hailey couldn't help but laugh both at Paige coughing so hard she gagged and the fact that she'd actually said what she just said. It was such a dude thing to say, but it was the best she could think of at the moment.

"What did you just say?" Paige said in raspy voice when she finally recovered nearly a minute later.

"When?" Hailey asked, trying to appear coy while actually trying to figure why the hell she'd put it that way.

"Just a second ago," Paige continued then coughed loudly before refusing the joint as she tried to recover.

"You don't want anymore?"

"You're so fucking weird."

"Why?" Hailey continued to play coy. This wasn't going that well.

"Stop messing with me because I've never been high before," Paige said with more than a little anger in her voice.

"Fine," Hailey said before deciding to continue down her original path, "but don't you agree?"

"With what, you weirdo?"

"That Shannon is cute, you dumb ass." Hailey said with a decidedly more playful tone as she gently pushed Paige's shoulder as if it was the most natural question in the world while Paige looked at her confused.

"Well, I do," Hailey continued, "and I'm pretty sure you do, too."

"You're so fucking weird," Paige said again, trying to sound angry, but Hailey could sense a little fear there. She really had no idea why she was so nervous about this, but she was and it was making what she was doing that much harder.

"Whatever. Why is it weird that I think she's cute?"

"Because she's a girl."

"So? I can't find girls cute? Is that not allowed?"

"Yeah, it's allowed, but it's weird."

"What's so weird about it? Girls are hot. They're cuter than boys anyway. No hair, soft skin, soft lips, they smell good. What's wrong with finding that attractive?"

"I don't know," Paige said after a long pause. Hailey could tell she was being studied and she knew Paige was cautious enough that if she felt she was being fucked with she would not be happy and would definitely not admit her own interest in girls. She wasn't stupid after all.

"Can I tell you a secret, Paige?" Hailey said changing her tone to something more serious.

"Of course you can," Paige said a little more lightly than before, "Just don't fuck with me."

"I'm gay," Hailey said, very seriously and very quietly.

"Shut up," Paige said, thinking that Hailey was just being a jerk.

"I'm not kidding. You remember Emma?" Hailey was trying very hard to get across to Paige how serious she was now. It appeared to be working as the look on Paige's face began to soften as she nodded her affirmation. "Well, there's a reason she left so abruptly and it wasn't because she was pregnant or any of that other horseshit everyone made up. She was my girlfriend. She moved away because one night when I was spending the night with her and we were, you know, and we forgot to lock the door and her step mom walked in on us and flipped out."

"Seriously," Paige's toned had definitely changed and she even sounded sympathetic as Hailey continued to tell her something she'd actually never told anyone besides her mom before. She was actually surprising herself with how honest and open she was being. This was not the way she had intended this to go down, but she just continued, getting things off her chest while Paige listened, occasionally offering Hailey her sympathy, but mostly just listening until Hailey started to cry. Then, like the good friend she was, Paige hugged her.

"I'm so sorry," Paige said as Hailey sobbed into her shoulder. "I had no idea. I thought you were being a jerk. I never even..."

"It's okay," Hailey interrupted as she willed herself to stop crying. It was rather nice to actually be able to say what she said even if she hadn't meant to say it, but she really hadn't meant to drop that kind of an emotional load on Paige's lap. "You couldn't know. Emma wanted it that way. She'd actually be mad if she knew I told you, but it just came out."

"It's okay. I want tell anyone," Paige offered without even being asked.

"Thank you. I know you won't. You're not like the other girls even though a lot of them have no room to talk," Hailey said almost without thinking, separating from Paige just enough to look into her eyes. They were beautiful in the bright moonlight.

"Oh, they aren't that bad. But I know what you mean. They talk too much shit," Paige almost whispered, as if someone might over hear them all the way out there.

"Well, everyone does. Everyone but you," Hailey said looking dreamily into Paige's eyes in a way that made Paige extremely nervous, but in a good way. Paige couldn't even begin to think of a response to that. Something had changed in the way Hailey was looking at her and she couldn't tell exactly what, but it made her feel good while at the same time it frightened her to the core. It only got worse as Hailey continued in a quiet voice.

"I know I've never told you this, but I really like you, Paige. I think you're a really good friend, probably my best friend in the world right now."

"I -I don't know what to say," Paige said in an equally quiet voice after what seemed like a long silence. "I really like you too, Hailey."

"I really want to kiss you right now," Hailey said, her voice barely a whisper as she watched Paige's eye go wide with a mixture of panic and anticipation. She knew Paige was not going to be able to answer her, so she continued. "Please don't hate me or run away, but I have t o do it right now or I'll regret it the rest of my life."

And, with that heavy line, Hailey kissed Paige and Paige melted. It was not a sexual kiss, but it was not merely a friendly one either. It was just a soft, tender and perfectly exquisite kiss that seemed to linger for a small eternity. It wasn't hurried and there was no blind groping; they simply held each other close while their mouths said more than they ever could with mere words.

Up until the moment Hailey's lips at met hers, Paige had been in a panic. The instant the kiss began the panic vanished. It was just so very, very right. It could have gone on forever or led to something more, but at that moment the sound of twigs cracking in the distance broke them from their sweet, blissful reverie.