One Day At A Time - Revised Edition

The following Friday after school, everyone had wished Ava, "good luck."

Before dropping her off, Lilly had held both of Ava's hands in hers and told her that she loves her and that she knows everything will be alright.
Love and reassurance stuck in Ava's mind as she tried her best to fall asleep.

Saturday rolls around and Ava wakes up to the faint sound of the twins laughing at cartoons on the TV in the living room.

Ava stirs awake and blankly stares up at the ceiling for a minute. She has Odin The Dragon tucked under her arm and she gives him a tight squeeze.

She plans out her morning in a straight-forward order: get up, have breakfast, get dressed, then talk to mom.

So, she sets her plan into action and sits up in bed, reaching over to pick her glasses up from her nightstand.

When she walks out into the kitchen, the twins are in the adjacent living room, watching Nickelodeon with syrup-covered plates from breakfast sitting on the coffee table in front of the couch.

Ava takes longer than usual to make herself breakfast.
She is slow to set two frozen waffles into the toaster and she takes her time with pulling out a plate and glass from the kitchen cabinet.

In the back of her mind, she is subconsciously procrastinating telling her mom these big things.

Ava becomes aware of her procrastination when Anne drops Andy and her's plates into the sink a few minutes later,
"Your waffles are done, why are you just... staring at them?"

Ava blinks hard and looks at the toaster.
She didn't even hear it pop up.

"I wasn't staring at them." She states quickly, taking them out of the toaster finally.
"Yes, you were."
"No, I wasn't."
"If you say so." (Anne doesn't push further. Ava is defensive and anxious, and she doesn't need an explanation as to why; less she make it worse.)

Throughout breakfast, Ava focuses herself on her plan, thinking about her friend's good luck wishes and Lilly's reassurance.

"Everything will be fine." is what she repeats to herself as she gets dressed some time later.

When she's done, Ava gives Odin a tight, good luck squeeze and she does the same to the yet-to-be-named, "Hug Me!" Valentine's Day bear.

She goes outside, where her mom is sitting on the porch swing, writing, what she's assuming to be, a grocery list for the upcoming week. (The weather is the right kind of warm where it isn't terribly, swelteringly hot. Ava takes after her mom; loving to soak up the sun on nice days like this. Though, today, she isn't here to do that.)

Donna looks at her from across the porch.
"Do you need anything from the store? I was just finishing up my list."
"No, I don't need anything. Can I, um, talk to you about something?" There's an anxious lump that forms at the back of Ava's throat.

"Can it wait until I get back from the store?"
Ava's hand finds itself holding into the hem of her shirt, tugging it.
"I would, I would prefer if it, if it didn't."

Donna sees the tug of her daughter's shirt and taps her phone that's on her lap, checking the time. She sets aside her list and pen,
"Well, it's only ten, I have some time. Come sit down."

Ava lets go of her shirt for a short moment as she walks over to the swing. The anxious lump in her throat is persistent, even when she tries to get rid of it.

"What did you want to talk about?"
"Well, um..." It takes a long hesitant minute, but she finds the right words, "Do you remember when I, when I told you about Lilly's Christmas party? She- Lilly kissed me and told me that she's in love with me, do you remember all that?"

Donna nods, thinking back,
"I remember. You had this look of... panic in your eyes when you told me about it. But I talked you through it, you seemed, at least, somewhat calmer by the end of it."

Ava can't help it when she laughs the tiniest bit.
It's funny, hilarious even, to where that panic lead her.

"That's what I wanted to talk about with, with you. After you and I talked, I had a lot of panic and, um, confusion."
She swallows the anxious lump down, she swallows it down hard. It bounces in her stomach like a rubber ball.
Boing, boing, boing...

She pushes forward, "I figured out that I, that I... love Lilly, too. In that same sort of way."

As it's always been, "love" is a brilliant word, a brilliantly beautiful and big word.
She loves Lilly and she has the privilege of telling her own mother that fact of her life.

She sits for a second, feeling her heart race in her chest.
"I'm in love with Lilly." She says it out loud to her, blunt as ever.

Donna gives herself a moment to process it; her face doesn't show negativity, neither does she feel any negativity. It shows curiosity more than anything.
"You love Lilly? Does she know?"
"Y-Yeah, she knows. We've been, um, together since February. I'm sorry I didn't... tell you earlier."

Donna sighs, her face soft and kind,
"No, please don't apologize. This is a big- a huge thing you just told me, I understand if it took you some time to work up the courage."
The anxious bouncing lump-ball dissolves. It fizzles away and Ava lets out a deep, heavy breath.

"So, you have a girlfriend, how does it feel?"
Calmness washes over her.
"I-I've never felt like this but it's been great. Just... great. I love... giving love to her. And I love being loved by her, too."
"I'm really happy for you. A first love is very special, I'm happy you have that with someone so close to you." (Donna remembers being that age and in love. She knows the feeling; she's grateful to hear Ava talk about it with the warmth that she does.)

Donna hugs her, and Ava's mind joyfully reels. Being able to tell her mom how much she loves Lilly feels so great that she doesn't have a word for it.
It's an indescribably grand feeling; her eyes are watery. Overwhelmed and overcome, but so happy.

When they let go of each other after a long few minutes, Donna tries to go about it as respectfully as she can, with what little she knows,
"Can I ask, are you gay or, or bisexual or... anything specific? Or have you not figured that out yet? It's okay if you haven't-"
"I'm queer, that's what it is."

She says it quickly- solidly, definitively- hearing the words come out of her mouth and into the air around them.
"Okay, then. I'm really happy you told me, hun." Donna says as she hugs her again. "I love you, I'll always love you, no matter what."

There are no ands, ifs, or buts about it. She says, "no matter what" solidly and definitively, too.

There's one final question on Donna's mind when their hug ends.
"Do Lilly's parents know? I know they aren't too- well they're... I don't know, but you said they were, I guess, not too happy with Lilly being gay."
"Yeah, they aren't too happy with, with it, and they don't know yet, but Lilly is working up the courage to tell them."
"Well, Lilly knows she's welcome here if anything... goes wrong."
Ava nods, and for a moment, she thinks about Lilly and the worst case scenario with her parents.

She blankly stares off for a second while she's in her own head. For right now, she doesn't let it worry her too much.

She'd just gotten a huge weight off of her shoulders and she is more than happy about it.

For a third time, Ava hugs her mom, and thanks her one final time.

When she lets her mom go and gets off of the swing, her eyes sting some, still watery.

She pushes her glasses up and rubs her eyes, smiling with relief.

Donna is looking at her, smiling, too,
"I love you. I don't want you to forget that, alright?"
"I won't forget. I love you, too."
"Well, good. I'm proud of you, too."

Ava goes through the rest of her day feeling pleasantly weightless.
She had done it. The weight is off her shoulders.