Page 159 of Daddy's Pride
“We have a responsibility to our attendees,” agreed Cat. “We need to make sure that this is a safe and inclusive space, and that means being hypervigilant about the kind of attention that it might attract.”
Emma, who’d worked with a couple of other queer kinky events in London, had helped sort out the ticket sales online, and they’d made sure that it said everywhere that it was a ticketed event and attendees needed to bring id with them.
“There’ll be people on the doors, both at the entrance to the venue, and at the main entrance to the hall,” Tel had pointed out. “We’ve got this.”
The four of them were in a pub garden, having some lemonade in the sunshine, although Rachel was sat beneath a large garden umbrella, trying to keep out of the sun so she didn’t burn.
“I think it’s the intersection between queerness and kink,” said Emma, thoughtfully. “One thing inflames one group of people, and the other another. Together it’s potentially explosive, but that doesn’t mean that we’re going to give in to bigots.”
It had been a while since Rachel had been part of a conversation that felt so charged. She hadn’t thought of the Littles’ Market as particularly radical when she and Cat came up with the plan, but she saw now that being so explicitly inclusive was making a statement. And it was a statement she was fully behind.
“Well, we want everyone in our community to be welcome, and we have trans and nonbinary vendors, so we have to make sure that their safety is prioritized.” She sighed. “How crap is it, that this is a key part of our event planning?”
“it’s good that you’re considering it though,” said Tel. “I often have to explain so much of this to events, and it gets exhausting explaining day after day how my government wants to pretend that people like me aren’t around. That they think that my mere existence is so terrible that it shouldn’t be discussed in schools.”
Rachel hugged them impetuously, and they smiled at her ruefully. “Thanks. Let’s talk about something else. What are everyone’s plans for the weekend?”
Cat was going to a music festival, Emma was working at a craft fair, and Rachel?
“Isla’s coming down for the weekend,” she said, trying not to blush.
The others all made appropriate teasing noises.
“It seems like she practically lives down here on the weekend,” said Cat.
“Yeah,” said Rachel. “It’s really nice. She tried to give me a bit of money toward the bills as well, because she’s round so often, but I pointed out that she’s got the travel costs.”
“Don’t you go up there, at all?”
“Not really.” Rach had been feeling funny about that, but Isla had reassured her that she much rather come down and stay with Rach.
“I can drive,” Isla’d said. “You don’t want the hassle and expense of having to deal with trains.”
“How do you feel about her coming down all the time?”
“It’s actually lovely, but whenever she leaves I get a bit sad. It’s so lush, playing house together, that when it comes to an end and she has to go home all those miles away, it’s pretty difficult.”
“So what you’re saying,” said Cat, “is that you want her to move to Brighton.”
“No no!” said Rachel. “I could never ask her to do that.”
Emma, Cat and Tel all exchanged looks. “Why not?”
“Because moving to a new city, just because you’re dating someone, isn’t a good idea. It can go wrong, and when it does…”
It had been awful. Rachel had actually met Isla because she’d been crying in the supermarket, and Isla had walked over, taken her shopping, and let her cry on her shoulder.
Rachel remembered looking into those green eyes through eyes brimming with tears, and blinking said tears away to see if those eyes could actually be that green.
“You are not your ex,” said Cat. “And you and Isla are in a solid relationship; I don’t think she’d hate the idea.”
“Maybe not,” said Rachel, “but it has to come from her. I can’t push her into doing something that she might regret.”
Chapter Fourteen
The week before the Littles’ Market was a busy one at Stuffie Hospital London.
“All hands on deck!” Susie had declared, and the team had come together to create a whole range of stuffies for Isla and Susie to take to the market.