A Christmas Date.
As she stood on the ice watching her date skate towards her it suddenly struck her just how surreal this situation was. Ever since she was a child she had dreamt about having one of those cliche Hallmark Christmas movie dates. The ones where the couple go ice-skating on a frozen lake in the dark, lit only by old fashioned street lamps, and then they go to an independent little coffee shop where they buy hot chocolates to drink whilst they walk around a snow covered park talking about their lives. However she never thought she’d actually get to do anything like that.
For a start, all those kind of movies only ever depicted straight couples, and she’d worked out pretty early on that she was anything but straight. Unfortunately the only ‘dates’ shown in lesbian movies were clandestine meetings whilst husbands were out at work. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for healthy adult relationships. In fact it kind of set the bar pretty low for what classed as a ‘good date’ between two women.
Her second issue was simply that she never thought she’d find someone to go on cute hallmark movie dates with. Not because of low self-esteem or any sort of lack of self worth, but more because of a hectic lifestyle trying just to make ends meet and a reluctance to settle for anything less than almost perfect. She’d been on a few dates from time to time, and she’d even had a girlfriend for a few months, but none of them had ever had any of that mystical hallmark potential.
This date however was different. It was her fourth date with a woman she’d met recently, a friend of a friend that she’d met at party. They’d hit it off straight away due to a shared love of slightly obscure sci-fi shows and had been texting each other ever since. It was quickly discovered that they had more in common than just a love of obscure sci-fi shows and a wicked sense of humour, and a first date had been organised followed in quick succession by a second and third.
They were now on their fourth date, and it was as close to a hallmark movie date she could ever hope to get. Sure it wasn’t a frozen lake all to themselves, it was a public open air ice rink, which they’d both fallen over on more than a few times. And maybe there wasn’t a few inches of fluffy white snow everywhere, but she had looked up the best place in the local area to go for a hot chocolate afterwards.
And in that moment, as she watched the other woman skating towards her, beanie hat on slightly wonky and cheeks slightly flushed, she realised that this date, and indeed this woman, may not have been perfect. But they were perfect to her.
A Place of Mine 