Poor Jenna had no idea what she was getting herself into. Rachel had warned her that it wasn't all puppies and flowers at home, but Rachel had known that her step sister Jenna simply didn't believe her and wouldn't until she saw for herself. The cold war between Rachel's mom and Jenna's dad was over. It was now time for naked aggression, drunken recrimination and bitter sarcasm and it was all just in time for Christmas.

Not that it was a surprise to anyone. The marriage had been on shaky ground for years. With Rachel's mother's constant cheating and Jenna's father's constant drinking and the long, loud fights that resulted from both Rachel knew things were going to go well. Jenna, however, having the luxury of still being away at college really had no clue just how bad it had become.

Rachel, sadly, didn't have that luxury. She had moved back home after dropping out of school after two years to get a crappy factory job and had quickly discovered that she just couldn't take it and moved back out of the house only a month later and into a crappy little upstairs apartment just to get away from all the yelling and flying whiskey bottles. That had been a few months ago and honestly she was surprised they hadn't given up the ghost already.

Jenna, however, was still under the delusion that Rachel had been exaggerating. Sure, she knew the facts of the situation, that her father had always been a bit of a drinker and that Rachel's mom was not quite the monogamous type, but she was absolutely certain that this was just another bad patch in a relationship that had suffered more than its share, but had always come out the other end seemingly stronger and better. Rachel almost admired her step sister's naïve sense of hope, but she really couldn't. She knew first hand that this just wasn't the same as the time her mom had slept with her boss or the time Jenna's dad had smashed up the Volvo while drunk on Jim Beam or a myriad of other incidents that had threatened her mother's second marriage.

No matter how bad it had gotten before it had always blown over. After a couple of weeks or maybe a month of constant fighting that was almost always followed by several months of relative peace, but this time that just didn't happen. It had been weeks now since they'd even slept in the same room let alone the same bed. Rachel had recently stopped doing laundry at their house even though with rent, bills, keeping herself in booze and weed and her car payment she could barely afford to eat because every time she was at the house she was either being used as a sounding board for various complaints about whichever one wasn't home ( she and her step father were actually quite close even though her mother had married him when she was already fifteen) or she spent most of her time hiding out back smoking while they either goaded each other in preparation for a fight or just plain yelled and screamed about whatever the issue of the day was.

Of course, she'd told Jenna all about this well before Christmas break, but Jenna just didn't want to believe it was that bad. Still, she did agree to Rachel's plan of staying at her apartment rather than at the house, but then only because Rachel convinced her it would be more fun to hang out and catch up somewhere they could get high without worrying too much about getting caught. This would prove to be a wise decision as Jenna quickly learned just how right Rachel had been.

Their parents didn't even make it through the first night without fighting. Of course, Jenna chose to ignore it and, luckily, that first night wasn't really all that bad. Neither was the second night, really. In fact, they were almost polite as they all had a nice dinner and unwrapped their presents with only minimal sniping. Jenna even insisted on staying the night that night and Rachel didn't argue with her for reasons she kept to herself.

What was the reason? Well, Rachel was gay and no one in her family had any idea. At least, as far as she knew no one did. Not that her being gay was the reason she was willing to let her sister spend the night at their parent's house. The night before she'd received a phone call from her most recent ex-girlfriend trying to get her to "come over and talk" which was essentially her backhand way of saying "I'm horny. Please come over so I can play mind games with you until I talk you into sleeping with me and then in the morning I'll reveal to you the fact that I'm still not ready to commit to a monogamous relationship." It was a game they'd been playing for months now and frankly, while Rachel hated the emotional head games, she was also incredibly horny. If Jenna hadn't been staying the night the night Ginger called she honestly would've given in then. Instead she called Ginger that night and had a night of great, but quickly regretted sex that proved to be the perfect starter for the next night with the family.

It wasn't until that night that Jenna was made to witness the shambles that was their unhappy little family and Rachel showed up feeling bitter and hung over and just in time to witness the climax of the evening's events. She also showed up just in time to dodge the telephone that was meant for her stepfather's head, but instead ended up in the front yard after passing through the section of space that had been occupied only a second before by Rachel's head.

She almost turned around and left, but Jenna came out of nowhere and grabbed her and pulled her into their old room where they remained for the next four hours or so talking about their parents while Rachel tried her best to not say "I told you so" too often and apologized countless times for turning off her phone and leaving Jenna without means of an escape. It wasn't a fun conversation in the least. They both loved Jenna's father and Rachel's mother, but it was clear that it was near the end of their marriage.

Of course, now that Rachel was there Jenna insisted they stay and wait it out. It wasn't until about eight o' clock with no real end in sight that she finally agreed to an exit after Rachel informed her that it just wasn't going to end until either one of them left or one of the neighbors called the police. Since neither seemed to be in any hurry to leave and Rachel just happened to have a quarter bag she'd picked up on the way over she felt it was best they get the hell out. Jenna was finally feeling inclined to listen to reason, so they attempted to leave without a word as soon as the sound of fighting died down enough for them to escape undetected.

It may have seemed weird to sneak out of their childhood home, but at that point they were fairly certain that their parents had likely forgotten they were there. Rachel had learned this lesson about a week after she moved back out when after a night of hiding in her room waiting for her laundry to finish she walked out with her garbage bag full of clothes thinking they'd both finally gone to bed only to catch them "making up" on the sofa. She had, of course, tried to just keep moving towards the door while averting her eyes and holding back her vomit, but her mother, of course, saw her and screamed and she learned that about the only thing more awkward then catching your parents having sex was having to have an angry conversation with them about it because they had no idea you were still home. After that she didn't even think about calling them for a full two weeks.

This time there was no gross parental sex going on in the living room, but they did run into Rachel's mother on their way out the door. She was standing outside smoking a cigarette something Rachel hadn't seen her do in years. She wasn't shocked to see them, at least not visibly. In fact, she really wasn't showing any emotion at all. It was awkward until Rachel tried to explain where they were going only to be interrupted by her mother saying "We're getting a divorce."

Neither girl had any idea what to say to that and Rachel's mother didn't really help all that much as she apologized with a dead voice before informing Jenna that her father wouldn't be around anymore, but that she was still welcome all in the same dead voice that didn't invite further inquiry. Jenna of course asked where her father was despite the coldness only to be answered with a blunt "I don't know and I don't care." This was followed slowly by a half hearted apology and a suggestion to call him when he sobered up.

After that there wasn't really all that much to say. Rachel just hugged her mother and promised to call her tomorrow and then Jenna did the same only without talking of a phone call. Rachel's mother didn't seem to notice and only said "Okay" as she tried to light another cigarette off of the last one unsuccessfully before throwing it to the ground with impotent anger. Rachel handed her mother her Zippo and she took it without a word before reminding them a bit rudely that they were leaving, so the girls got in Rachel's car and drove off as they watched Rachel's mother start to dial some number on the phone. Rachel could've guessed whose number it was, but, honestly, she didn't really care at that moment. She simply wanted to leave.

The ride back to Rachel's apartment was a little weird. Rachel and Jenna barely spoke at all. Mainly because there wasn't really too much to say, but also they were both a little lost in their own thoughts. They both secretly felt they should be a little more worried than they were, but, honestly, they were both more than a little relieved. Not happy by a long shot, but definitely relieved. It was a dark feeling that pretty much quieted even the thought of a conversation.

Normally it would have been hard for a third party to even think of getting a word in edgewise, but now it just didn't seem appropriate even though they still had a lot to catch up on. So far they'd barely even spoken about anything but their parents and now neither one of them really wanted to talk about that at all.

Rachel and Jenna had always been close. Well, not always, but it definitely seemed like it most of the time. There had been a brief period of awkwardness between them when their parents first got married and a very reluctant Jenna was forced to not only leave her old life, friends and school for strange newness, but was also forced to share a bedroom with a girl she barely knew.

It hadn't lasted long though. After a few weeks of bitter silence they both kind of just started gravitating towards each other thanks to common interests. Mainly, it was a shared interest in marijuana and obscure (for small town suburbia) music, but from those sprang a great deal of shared enthusiasms. The fact that they were only a year apart in age and actually complemented each others deficiencies in academics didn't hurt. Pretty soon they were almost inseparable and kept very few secrets from each other with the one major exception being the real reason Rachel never went all the way with her boyfriends.

That was actually a major hidden conflict in their friendship and, to make it just a little bit worse, there was a perfectly good reason why Rachel had kept it a secret even though she knew Jenna likely wouldn't even care: Jenna, her step sister and closest friend in her mixed up, very modern family was her first official full-on crush from hell and, as luck would have it, she was also the first girl she'd ever really kissed one drunken night when they were still in high school.

It was an awkward little incident that resulted from a dare at a party that had scared the shit out of Rachel at the time. It also quickly became a shameful addition to her mental masturbation library that still remained in circulation in the darker reaches of her brain. For Jenna, however, it was nothing more than a lark she used to win the attentions of a boy Rachel was sure she'd long ago forgotten the name of.

Jenna's flippant attitude about the whole thing made it all just that much worse. She still brought it up whenever they happened to be around each other long enough to get drunk or high together. This was a rare occasion anymore now that Jenna was usually hundred's of miles away at college, but when it did happen it was always awkward and had actually led to a few low key fights between them when Jenna teased her a bit too hard about it.

About the only benefit of the whole thing was it actually led to Rachel finding her first girlfriend. When the whole thing was brought up for the umpteenth time in front a mutual friend who was more than a little curious herself she insisted that Rachel sleepover at her house the next night and they ended doing very little sleeping. Her name was Andrea and they ended doing the sleepless sleepover thing several times a week over the remainder of that summer and whenever possible during the following school year until Andrea had a religious conversion after her Father's death and ended everything because she didn't want to go to hell.

Beyond that it was really just a pain in the ass because while it was major milestone in the formation of Rachel's sexuality it was nothing but a tease to Jenna as far as Rachel knew. Really though, it had been an awesome kiss that simply shocked Rachel with its pureness and beauty. For a long time she actually wondered if really had been just a boy trap to Jenna, but after awhile she dropped that idea because all evidence seemed to point to the fact that that was exactly what it was to her.

Still, she was attracted to her despite the fact that she knew nothing would come of it. Jenna was just too cute not to be attractive to Rachel. In fact, though she'd never admit it, most of her girlfriends had more than a passing resemblance to Jenna who was a short, thin, small breasted little pixie of a girl with a cute, elfish nose, pouty little lips and big brown eyes under a mane of naturally dark brown hair (though often it was either some unnatural shade of blonde or, on occasion, a nice black) that was usually kept long and wavy, but sometimes was cut to shoulder length, but always seemed to perfectly frame her beautiful face.

More than a few of Rachel's girlfriends (both serious and less than serious) fit that description in at least a handful of ways. A few of them even fit it to the tee. Of course, change the hair to almost always shoulder length to occasionally a bit shorter and always black and up her height by a couple inches and make the breasts about a cup size bigger and lips a tad thinner and that was pretty much Rachel as well. In fact, they looked similar enough that most people tended to think they were natural sisters and not just step siblings, but they weren't and that made the attraction just a bit less shameful.

Still, she was a wee bit older now and much more experienced and even though she was still very attracted to her step sister Rachel was more than willing to let it go. If only Jenna would stop bringing it up. That was why she almost said no to Jenna when, as their silent ride home was nearing its end, she asked her rather bluntly: "Wanna get stoned and forget about all this stuff?"

"Dude, that is the dumbest question I've heard in a long time," This was, of course, the only logical answer despite any awkwardness that might occur later. She wanted nothing more at the moment than to get good and stoned and just relax. Well, there was one thing she wanted more than that, but that was not likely to happen.

"So that's a yes?" Jenna smiled wickedly hoping to lighten the mood a bit.

"I stand corrected," Rachel replied trying hard to maintain her dead pan look until Jenna punched her arm playfully and called her a bitch and making her laugh despite herself.

"Ugh, finally," Jenna said loudly, "You can smile! I was beginning to think aliens had abducted my awesome step sister and replaced her with some morose gloom and doom robot or something."

"Fucking English major," Rachel teased back with a smirk as she felt her mood begin to lighten despite herself. "You've only been home three days, you dink."

"Whatever, Rachelbot. I'm totally on to you. And it's English minor. I switched to education over a year ago. God, you never read my emails, I swear."

The dam had broken and the two young women started to chat and joke as if nothing was wrong with the world. Not out of coldness towards the situation with their parents, but more out of the necessity of keeping their sanity intact. Besides, it was only natural. They hadn't seen each other in months unless you counted the last couple of days when they barely spoke at all except about depressing things. If Rachel hadn't been so preoccupied with her own shitty life and the crap going between their parents this would've happened the moment they were both in the same room for the first time.

By the time they pulled into the parking lot and headed up to Rachel's apartment Rachel was already suffering from a severe case of perm-a-grin despite the fact that they had yet to even roll a joint. Jenna just had that kind of an affect on her. She wasn't alone however as Jenna couldn't help but smile brightly at her in return.

It took less then an hour for them to get all caught up on why Jenna's classes and professors sucked more than Rachel's job and why their sex life was so much better than the other's as they quickly smoked the joint that Jenna had apparently already rolled in anticipation of this very event. In fact, she had several joints already rolled thanks to her apparent mastery of her newest, favoritest toy, as she put it, a cheap, little plastic rolling machine that Rachel made fun of her for even owning.

"Whatever," Jenna quickly retorted, "At least I can roll. Most girls at my school smoke bowls because they can't roll a joint. They always have their boyfriends do it for them."

"When will they ever learn?" Rachel responded in an appropriate tone of faux disappointment as she exhaled her latest hit.

"Totally," Jenna responded absentmindedly before asking the question that unintentionally got the ball rolling in a completely unintended direction. "So ... speaking of boyfriends, still without?"

"Oh, god, yes," Rachel responded strongly as she handed off the joint.

"You're so weird," Jenna came back while holding in her hit.

"Whatever," Rachel said before she gave away a little more than she intended as she forgot she was talking to someone who had no idea she was gay, "Guys are so fucking gross. I can't even imagine letting one of those hairy bastards fuck me."

"Wait," Jenna said as she quickly turned to lock her eyes on her step sister, "What?" It took a minute for Rachel to realize that she'd just told her step sister that she found the idea of sex with men repulsive. She'd just said it straight up without even sugarcoating the sentiment at all. She actually froze for a minute as she realized that what she'd just said was pretty much the same as stating flat out "I'm gay." Finally, she managed to sputter out a "whatever" before following it up with a weak attempt to turn the conversation to Jenna's sex life with absolutely no success.

"Dude," Jenna continued with her usual gender bending familiarity, "Are you gay?" Rachel thought for a minute about playing it off as a joke, but one frightened glance at Jenna's serious looking face made her instantly realize that her very blunt slip of the tongue had removed all chances of that. Jenna may have been stoned, but she wasn't an idiot. Still, she tried as she weak uttered the word no in a weak, half hearted near whisper.

"Don't lie to me, Rachel," Jenna continued with a serious tone that contained no malice, but still filled Rachel with fear. "You're gay, aren't you?"

"Why? Because I think guys are gross?" Rachel responded. Her irrational fear made her feel like she was being backed into a corner even though she knew Jenna meant nothing hurtful by her accusation.

"Well, yeah," Jenna kept on, "And other things..."

"What other things?" That last little bit almost felt like a hard punch to Rachel's sense of privacy. It was weird. It was almost insulting to think that Jenna may have suspected her along.

"Well, there's the fact that you've never had a boyfriend, the fact that I've never even seen you kiss a boy, you've never said a boy was cute and ... the kiss we..."

"So what if I am?" Rachel said suddenly feeling a little defensive for no good reason. "What the fuck does it matter?"

"Dude, calm down," Jenna said. "No one ever said it did. I don't care if you're into girls. It's, like, the twenty first century. I mean whatever. You don't dig penis. Who gives a crap? Chill." Rachel sat there for a few seconds longer looking pissed and feeling a bit stupid for freaking on Jenna for no good reason. Of course Jenna didn't care. Why would she? Still, she couldn't just stop bring pissed for no reason, so she sat there and pouted until Jenna got sick of it.

"Seriously, relax. I didn't mean to piss you off, okay. I just didn't know. I mean, like, I suspected, but..." Jenna started before being interrupted.

"What do you mean you suspected?" Rachel said still a little pissed for no good reason.

"For all the reasons I already said and, I don't know, I just always kind of got that vibe from you. Like not in a bad way, it's just, I don't know. I'm high. I'm just babbling. Seriously, though it's, like, who cares? Stop being pissy! I should be pissed at you for not trusting me enough to say anything, you jerk. I thought we told each other everything."

Suddenly, Rachel stopped feeling pissed and instead shifted to feeling like a full on idiot. Jenna was absolutely right. She really should've told her she was gay a long time ago. Not because it was any of her business or anything, but because they were friends and the closest thing either of them had to a real sister. They trusted each other. Rachel apologized to Jenna who, of course, told her to shut up before Rachel hugged her and then followed up with a deep, detailed conversation about why she never came out and other serious things that would have been better discussed while sober, but were so much easier to get out while high.

It actually felt freeing to finally tell Jenna that she was gay and that she always had been. Until that moment she hadn't realized how much of a drag it had all been on her soul to keep such a big part of her life a secret from someone she cared about so much. It actually made her a little freak out only moments before seem that much more ridiculous as, despite the serious tone Rachel began with, the atmosphere began to noticeably lighten and they started to joke again as if they were talking about anything else until Jenna started asking her questions.

Some of them were quite innocent while others were a little more personal than Rachel was willing to get into and which were which wasn't always obvious. Rachel had no idea what to say when Jenna asked her who the first girl she ever kissed was, but she eventually, after a bit of prodding and another joint, told Jenna that it was her.

"No f'ing way!" was Jenna's exuberant response, "I took your girl kissing cherry?"

"Umm, if you wanna put it that way, sure," Rachel said after she stopped laughing before Jenna said something that actually scared her a bit, but also made her heart jump despite herself.

"You know," Jenna started slowly and then paused before she finally spit it out in a breathy whisper, "I never told you this, but that kiss was totally awesome. I still think about it sometimes. Does that make me weird?"

Rachel, who had been taking a hit when Jenna said that nearly passed out when the shock of what her step sister just said hit her and she choked on the hit before going into a coughing fit. When she finally recovered enough to talk all she could manage was "What?"

"What do you mean what?" Jenna came back feeling a little defensive, "It was a good kiss. Like all soft and sensual. Don't tell me you didn't like it, Lesbo. You're the one who stuck your tongue in my mouth, remember."

"Oh my god!" Rachel said as she covered her eyes and started to blush, "So what? We were kids!"

"Grow up. You liked it. I know you did. You kissed your step sister and you loved it. You're a total perv." Rachel had no idea how to take this. If she didn't know any better she would've thought Jenna was flirting with her, but she just couldn't allow herself to even consider entertaining that possibility. It was just too weird.

"You are so strange," Rachel finally came back. Her cheeks were still burning as she blushed and tried in vain to turn the conversation back on Jenna. "If you liked it so much why did you go fuck that douche bag afterwards? Hmmm?"

"Duh," Jenna shot back while still smiling devilishly, "Because that's what dumb high school girls do. We have sex with dumb high school guys even when we know it's going to suck. Besides, you're my step sister and it was supposed to be just a tease. I didn't know you were a lesbian."

"And if you had?" Rachel asked hoping in a way to stop Jenna's teasing while at same time hoping it wasn't teasing at all.

"I don't know! God..." Jenna actually looked a little a nervous as she said that and Rachel sensed an opening and began her own attack.

"What's that mean? Have you thought about it?" Rachel asked bravely.

"What? Thought about what?" Jenna responded her voice getting a little quiet as if Rachel's response meant everything. Rachel picked up that and even though a part of her wanted to press on with something more specific she chickened out and went with a more general question.

"Having sex with a girl, stupid. Have you ever thought about it?"

"Oh," Rachel couldn't help but notice more than a hint of disappointment in Jenna's voice as she said that and then continued after laying down her back, "Well, yeah. Like what girl doesn't at least think about it?"

"But you've never done anything?" Rachel said. She was starting to get seriously aroused despite herself. She'd had this conversation before many times and most of the time it meant one thing: she was about to get laid or, at least, she was planting the seed for an eventual seduction. Two out of her last four girlfriends had been won over with a conversation very much like the one she was having now with Jenna. The other two girlfriends had already been well aware of their sexuality and both had actually been the aggressors when it came to initiating the first encounter. Not that she was honestly thinking about seducing Jenna, at least not consciously. Well, she wasn't trying to think about it at all, but her hard nipples that were currently tenting under her thin t-shirt and bra and that familiar tingling in her nether regions were firm evidence to the contrary even if she ignored the dirty thoughts currently occupying her brain.

"No," Jenna answered after a long pause as she stared into Rachel's eyes nervously. She too was trying hard to not realize that there was something different about this conversation as she ignored the fact that her body was reacting in much the same that Rachel's was, "I've never done anything. Well, not really anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I've never, like, had sex with another girl. Not really."

"What's not really?"

"Well ... remember Emmie?" Jenna was whispering softly as she said that that Rachel actually had a hard time hearing, but she nodded in affirmation just the same. She knew exactly who Emmie was. She was Jenna's best friend during her senior year at high school. They'd been almost inseparable almost as soon as Emmie moved to their town from some southern state, one of the Carolina's, Rachel could never remember. "Well ... I can't believe I'm telling you this..."

"Whatever," Rachel said as Jenna paused and covered her eyes with her hand and blushed a little, "Tell me."

"We use to ... you know ... together when we slept over at her house," Jenna's face was a deep red as she spoke and that alone was enough for Rachel to figure out that 'you know' meant masturbation. Of course, she would've figured out without the blushing thanks to Jenna's little hand gesture as she said it that was clearly meant to imply fingers rubbing a clit.

"That is so hot," Rachel replied in a sarcastic tone to hide the truthful sentiment behind the statement.

"Oh, shut up, weirdo," Jenna said as she somehow got even redder, "You're almost my sister, you slut. You're not supposed to think that me masturbating with another girl is hot."

Jenna was teasing, but Rachel was beginning to realize she wasn't the only one in the room getting turned on by this odd conversation. There was definitely a lot of subtext going on.

Rachel used the joint as an excuse to pause while she thought of an appropriate response. As she saw it there were several ways to go with this. She could either try to sidestep the issue, change the subject or press on bravely. A large part of her was of the opinion that she should drop it now, that she was headed into dangerous territory that she might regret trespassing upon later even if nothing came of it. Another part of was of the mind that whatever happened happened. It wasn't like they were really sisters, after all. Hell, soon their parents wouldn't even be together if nothing changed and Rachel just couldn't see it changing at this point.

"Yeah, almost, but not really," Rachel finally said when she was done exhaling before quickly adding, as if to hide the implications of what she just said, "Is that all you guys did together? Just masturbate?"