But after meeting Lynette, I saw how much pride she took in her butch womanhood, which wasn’t some androgynous nowhere zone — femininity’s absence — but a whole universe unto itself. (She wore a different suit to dinner every night.) When I first pitched this story to my editors, I thought I’d be reporting on a lesbian cultural artifact in its twilight years. The women who’ve faithfully gone on dozens of Olivia trips over the decades are getting older, and I didn’t have a lot of faith that younger queer people were going to step in and save companies like this from extinction. Other elements of lesbian culture have been steadily dying; why should Olivia be any different? After being hit, one woman went to the police station only to be told that “the man who hit you deserves a prize, he was right to beat you up”. I felt crazy. I felt like a teenager. I felt guilty and confused, like I had no idea what I was doing. But I also knew that I might not ever do anything quite like this in my life ever again. So I might as well let myself live through this bizarro universe and see where it would take me. Burundi is well known in the Great Lakes for its vibrant nightlife. Bujumbura has fewer than 500,000 inhabitants, but maintains a vivid youth culture.

It was thrilling, and cathartic, to have such a deep, generous conversation with three smart women about a question that’s been at the center of my personal and professional life for nearly five years now: Can lesbians, and women in general, survive the gender revolution? I would tell my partner that I cared about them deeply, and the past five years were among the best of my life. I wouldn’t trade them for anything. But I also felt like we had come to a crossroads, and we weren’t facing the same futures. I had tried so hard to see myself in their dreams, but now I was having dreams of my own. And I didn’t think I saw a future, even a part-time one, in Montana. An often-cited report by Human Rights Watch in 2009 spoke with only 10 members of the LGBT+ community and only one lesbian was interviewed. The BBC has spoken to dozens.Alice Exodia is your small titty goth girlfriend from the French side of Canada. She’s been naughty, and quite liked it, so she’s continuing the trend, and showing you just how naughty she can really be. She points out that her wall is explicit, so you can expect to be hard right when you arrive. These terms are known as ‘lesbian genders’ and work to name a few gender expressions within lesbianism. And often, these terms come with a rich history. When her parents died, Nella's brothers increased the pressure. There was no money for an education, they said, and besides they didn't believe a woman needed one.

Part of the reason why is no doubt what anti-trans lesbians (unreasonably) fear: More and more young people are realizing that they identify as a gender other than the one they were assigned at birth — and more and more young people are realizing they’re attracted to people of two or more genders. But even though there are plenty of trans and nonbinary lesbians, and plenty of cis lesbians (like me) who don’t think that “lesbian” should be defined exclusively as “cis woman who’s only attracted to cis women,” our identity still hasn’t been able to shake the sexist, classist, and anti-gay stereotypes of lesbians as uncosmopolitan boomer TERFs, sporting Tevas and cargo pants covered in cat hair. She had looked up YouTube videos of lesbian vloggers in other parts of the world. She watched films featuring same-sex couples and read a lot of reports on lesbian, bisexual and queer (LBQ) communities. She began to understand the language of the internet. If you have masturbated and spent time exploring your own body, use the knowledge you have gained of what feels good to direct your partner.

It largely relies on internet shorthand, obscure symbols used by lesbians around the world. Nella would send these images and emoticons to other women. Those in the know would respond. Tourists from neighbouring Rwanda, Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo can be found enjoying the nightlife in the clubs or the five-star hotel bars. Leila, Niya - and later Nella - formed a community. Now there are dozens of women who see themselves as Burundi’s secret lesbian collective. Some have support from their families. A few are married with children. No-one is openly out.

The T-shirts are important because printed on each one is a discreet, matching symbol. It’s an in-joke – a sign of their identity and independence. Something only they understand.

Arts

But she needn’t have worried. Leila didn’t lose her friendship. The two agreed to draw a line under the embarrassing episode. I would tell my therapist everything in one fell swoop, and I’d be so relieved and grateful when she seemed genuinely happy for me. The woman, while being a lesbian, was not arrested for her sexuality - the authorities were unaware of it, she believes. It was because the woman had retaliated against domestic abuse in her family home, and lashed out against her abuser. She plays the drums, loves cars — like, posts-on-car-forums-level loves cars — and follows tech news. She cares about clothes and buys a lot of hers vintage. She just got a tattoo commemorating Liverpool, her beloved football team. I was less confident. But perhaps it wasn’t that I didn’t trust my partner; it was that I didn’t trust myself. For so long, I’d put off the possibility of us opening up our relationship because — try as I might to be cool and aloof and whatever about casual hookups — I typically like sex best when the person matters to me.

Communicate. Your partner can’t know what feels good unless you let them know, right? So, speak up. If you’re shy, use noises or movements to express yourself. Try guiding your partner’s head if your partner is comfortable with that; hold it in place and press yourself against them if they’re OK with it. This is a great way to give guidance, and it can be sexy as hell. Then something happened that she didn’t anticipate. Leila’s brother went through her phone and found the text she had sent to her friend.I would feel horrible, hurting a person I cared for, even though I was certain they wouldn’t be able to care for me in the years ahead in the way I needed them to — someone who I suspected, ultimately, wanted different things. How do you justify leaving a perfectly nice relationship, taking a blind chance that there might be something better for you out there — even if you’re right? In 2016, her husband found out about these conversations and her marriage broke down. He vowed to keep her sexuality a secret from the wider community for the sake of their children. Nella sends a photo to the BBC using an encrypted app. She's pictured sitting on a chair with young children around her. It's more than a kind of first love. It's a first everything: first friendship, first real companion, intellectual companion. There's a trust from the first moment they look at each other, that this person understands me. And in a way that they've never had before," Waterston tells The Advocate.