“Of course, you don’t,” Carol said snidely. She didn’t appear to like Orville any more than Joy did. Another thing in common. Having a roommate couldn’t be that bad? Could it?
Chapter Two
“I can’t believe you did this. How do you know she’s not a serial killer?” asked Joy’s best friend, Angela. Angela was a zero-to-sixty kind of person. At the moment, she wore a ballcap with her long brown hair pulled out through the hole at the back. Today was moving day and they were standing in front of Joy’s storage locker.
“I don’t know why you think you have to move out already. We’re doing just fine as roommates,” Angela said.
She looked at Angela, her tone plaintive. “I’m living on your couch in a studio apartment. Not to mention you snore. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since I moved in.” Joy refrained from saying sleeping on the couch had sent her to the chiropractor twice for neck and back pain. Angela’s couch was lumpy and covered in ugly plaid upholstery.
Joy looked at her own couch. She and Carol hadn’t discussed living room space or kitchen items or who got the bathroom first thing in the morning. All sorts of habits and tastes had gone unanswered. They were veritable strangers.
“I snore?” Angela asked aghast. “None of my past girlfriends complained.”
“They wanted to have sex and fall in love just not with a person who snores,” Joy teased. Angela had the same kind of luck Joy did with girlfriends. They had both turned forty this year and finding an unsettled-down lesbian was getting harder and harder. “You don’t snore.”
“I knew it. Don’t tease about my lack of a girlfriend. I’m feeling sensitive and vulnerable. Sherry really messed with my head,” Angela said.
Sherry was the last of a long list of girlfriends. She was a massage therapist and found that Angela was ticklish when it came to massages—she squirmed and twitched. Sherry found this offensive. No matter what they tried, soft music, candlelight, scented oil, the minute the massage started the mood was ruined. “I think I might be cursed.”
“More like you’re between girlfriends,” Joy said.
They stared into the abyss that was Joy’s storage closet. The eviction had been abrupt, forcing Angela and Joy to cram what they could every which way into the storage unit.
“This is going to be horrible,” Joy said, feeling defeated before they had even gotten started. She should’ve done what most children who moved out did and left half of her memorabilia in her mother’s attic. Of course, that wouldn’t have worked; her mother had to clear out her attic and consolidate her own possessions when she had moved to Palm Springs last year. Ella Hammond had decided it was time for some fresh desert air and so her daughter had been forced to take her stuffed animals, early childhood treasures, report cards, a certificate of participation in T-ball, and a dodge ball trophy from an afterschool program.
She had been an asset to the team because she’d been difficult to hit. It wasn’t her athletic ability that created her success; she was petrified of the ball and she was fast at avoiding the slap and sting of it. Joy wasn’t athletic or artistic despite her mother spending Joy’s childhood trying to find something she was good at. They never did find it. Joy was mediocre at most things, but she was good at selling houses. She had found something she was good at after all. “It’ll come,” her mother had told her. It had.
She toed the box of memorabilia, undecided about what with it. Should she throw away her childhood treasures? She picked up a well-worn felt-covered buffalo. She’d been into the Wild West when she was six. She remembered stroking the buffalo’s back whenever she was anxious, especially during the acrimonious divorce. Her father had disappeared so he wouldn’t have to pay child support. Her mother went onto to get a business degree and got her real estate license and made a killing during the housing market bubble.
“That needs to be thrown away,” Angela said, plucking it out of Joy’s hands.
Joy had been stroking the well-worn felt. “But it reminds me of things.”
“I remember the story of the buffalo. Why would you want to keep something that reminds you of what a dick your dad was and still is?”
Angela and Joy had been friends since the fifth-grade. Angela knew all of Joy’s darkest secrets. Sometimes, Joy wished her younger self had been more discerning when she had told Angela her hopes and dreams, but that’s what best friends were for. Still, it was embarrassing seeing her younger self in Angela’s eyes. Angela knew everything.
They would have had made a perfect couple with their synergy, but you just don’t date the one person who knows your entire history from childhood to the present. It was too much information. There wasn’t a lot of picking and choosing when it came to your life’s narrative when your girlfriend knew absolutely everything about you. They should’ve met in their twenties or early thirties and then they would have made a good match. And there was always the risk of losing your best friend if you broke up. She couldn’t live without Angela in her life.
“Oh my god, look at this,” Angela said, holding up a framed photo. “It’s of you and Rudy.”
Joy took the frame from her and stared at her first girlfriend. Rudy was a petite brunette, well-built, and an avid softball player. She had the most amazing deltoids and calves. Joy had loved her body, every inch of it. They had lasted four years—a mostly good four years, then Rudy decided she wanted to explore dating. They’d been young, not even twenty when they first met and by twenty-four the seven-year inch had set in three years early. They’d stayed friends for a while, but deep in Joy’s psyche she knew that she had never recovered from that loss. Perhaps it had tainted love from that moment forward. Joy had never let herself go that deep again.
Her girlfriends after that must’ve sensed that she held something back. She couldn’t risk her heart until she found the right one and her dream girl wasn’t anywhere on the horizon despite meeting lots of lesbians. She advertised in the Pink Directory where gay and lesbian services were on offer. But most women she met were couples looking for their nest, not looking to date the realtor.
“What are you going to do with this couch?” Angela asked, giving it a disgusted poke.
“Move it,” Joy said. She was offended. She’d had that couch since Rudy. It wasn’t that old. Joy knew from staging houses that most people didn’t buy new furniture often.
“Have you seen the armrests on this thing? Angela said.
They were tattered, Joy observed, sticking her finger into the stuffing below in the wear spots. “Doilies?”
“Didn’t you tell me your roommate, I still can’t believe you’re doing this, is like some fashion freak?” Angela said.
“She works in an exclusive boutique,” Joy said.
“Exclusive? Did she tell you that?”
“No, but I googled the Boutique.”
“You’re not going in with a complete lack of foreknowledge; is that what you’re telling me?” Angela said, incredulous.
Joy studied her friend as Angela picked through boxes, muttering. Angela had large doe-like brown eyes and brown hair down to her waist. She was on the short side and struggled with her “ever-expanding” hips. Weight and lack of height were the bane of her existence.
“Angela, I know what I’m getting into.”
“If you say so,” Angela said.
“I do.”
“Most of this stuff really needs to go. This is the perfect time to divest yourself of a lot of crap.” She picked up a gnawed up black spatula. “Really, you want to keep this?” She waved it at Joy.
“But I need a spatula.” It was like an episode from Hoarders. Angela was right. She needed to divest herself of all this sentimental crap. She would keep a few trinkets but most of it could go.
“Buy a new one. How about this?” Angela asked – she was a master negotiator, “We throw out the shit, then we’ll make a list of what needs to be replaced, like this...” She waved a well-worn throw pillow.
Joy looked at the summ
ation of her life squeezed into a large-sized storage unit. She had collected and hung onto memories that needed to be put behind her. She’d had good times with her ex-girlfriends, including Rudy. It hadn’t been all bad, but did she need things to remind her of her life? Why couldn’t she give stuff up?
The well-worn kitchen gear reminded her of Rudy when they had first gotten together and had nothing. They’d moved into their first apartment only to discover it didn’t come with things like dishes and some mysterious fairy didn’t supply the toilet paper or do the laundry. Going out on their own had been enlightening and fun. She didn’t need kitchen gear to remind her of love. Besides, it had lead a double life; when the next girlfriend would get out the spatula and give Joy’s ass a tap indicating she would like to make love. Goodness... how could she be spending all this time thinking about a damn spatula. Who cares? Let it go.
“You’re right. Most of this stuff needs to go,” Joy said.
“It’s time you shucked off the past. Live in the present.”
Angela previously had a girlfriend that made them go to couple’s retreats to further their bond into a symbiotic synergy. That relationship lasted a year and a half until Angela was coupled out. It had been a terrible breakup. Janice, her girlfriend, was convinced that when Angela broke up with her, she had amputated a chunk of Janice’s soul. The one take away was the positive vibe that Angela still retained. Another one of Angela’s girlfriends couldn’t abide Joy and Angela’s friendship at all. They’d had to sneak off to have coffee every now and again. It was the toughest year of Joy’s life. She missed Angela so much. Damn, they both had woman troubles.
Joy summoned her determination to make a new life shorn of her old and tattered one. If this storage unit was any indication of the state of her life, Joy needed to make some changes. And fast. “Get the trash bags.”
Chapter Three
“You decorated the apartment without any input from me?” Joy frowned, her arms akimbo. The furniture was white with square cushions, the frame of the couch was chrome. It looked straight out of Architectural Digest. The coffee table was glass with brushed chrome legs. The two chairs with ottomans looked slightly more comfortable, but were also white. It looked like a room that no one could sit in. It was completely unacceptable.
“I have a friend who’s an interior designer.”
“You would,” Joy mumbled.
“What was that?” Carol said, putting her hand to her ear, “I didn’t hear you.”
“I said it makes perfect sense that you would have one.”
“You’re already getting to know me,” Carol said. “Want to see the kitchen?”
“Do I have a choice? I suppose you completely furnished it as well,” Joy said.
“You didn’t seem like a Williams-Sonoma kind of girl,” Carol said. She walked to the kitchen. Joy followed her like an obedient dog expecting a treat. Ugh, if this was any indication of how life was going to be, it looked a lot tougher than she had imagined.
The kitchen was done up in retro furniture. Chrome and linoleum-topped table with four chrome chairs, upholstered in red. The fridge looked really old – the defrost-the freezer-kind of fridge – but was really a cutting-edge replication. The retro look worked in this room. Joy had to admit Carol had nice taste. “Can I use anything in here?”
“I would prefer it if you did. As you can probably tell, I like to have beautiful things around me.”
Well, Carol was going to have to put up with living with a not-beautiful woman... and the new chair coming this afternoon. Joy might not be a Williams-Sonoma kind of girl, but she had purchased the new chair at the Pottery Barn. It was upholstered in comfortable brown distressed leather, with a matching ottoman and a complimentary dark cherry wood side-table. Joy knew just where she was going to put it—right by the long windows in the living room. She didn’t care if it didn’t go with the white furniture; she paid half the rent. She imagined herself sitting in her chair with her reading lamp next to it. It would be perfect. She would sit and read in blissful silence.
“I have a chair coming this afternoon and I want that space right there,” Joy said, pointing, when they returned to the living room. As if summoned, the buzzer rang. They both jumped. Joy went to answer the intercom and buzz in the furniture men.
“Yeah, this is Frank. I’ve got a delivery for Joy Hammond.”
“That’s me,” Joy said. “I’ll meet you at the door.”
“Sounds good,” Frank said.
“Tell me it isn’t hideous. It’ll ruin the whole flow of the room not to mention being a complete waste of an interior designer,” Carol said.
“It’s my chair and it’s going there,” Joy said, pointing to the corner by the window.
Carol huffed off to the kitchen, evidently unable to observe the infringement of her good taste being brought on by the delivery of an unsanctioned chair.
“Yeah, why don’t you go make a cappuccino or something,” Joy called out after her.
“I will. Would you like one?” Carol said, mercurially.
Joy was taken aback by this but who in their right mind turned down a cappuccino?
“Well, if you making one, anyway, sure, I’d like one.” Joy narrowed her eyes. Was she being placated? More like played. It would take a while or maybe never, before she would trust someone like Carol. Carol could be a sociopath. Joy realized she had better stay away from those movies where people have psycho roommates. This one had decorated the apartment. Joy could see turf wars in their future.
She met Frank at the front door. Her chair was here! She was delighted. Her new life was beginning. No wonder people changed out their furniture. It was fun. She had a bed frame coming from IKEA that she would have to put together, as well as a dresser and a nightstand. She might be flush at the moment, but famine could be around the corner in the real estate market. Her mother had taught her that. Always hold back six months’ worth of cash as a safety net. She had sprung for the expensive chair, but the rest of her furniture would have to be more cost effective.
“Hi there,” Frank said, holding the chair all by himself. He was a brute of a man with the face of a boy scout.
“Oh, my goodness! Let me help you,” Joy said hurrying to open the door wider so he could get the chair through it.
“Where’d you like it?” he asked. His muscles bulged out of his short-sleeved T-shirt.
While Joy pointed to the corner by the window, Carol came out of the kitchen holding two cappuccinos. Frank saw her and dropped the chair. He stared at Carol. He was awestruck by this Victoria Secret model standing in the living room holding two cappuccinos in white mugs.
“Here’s your cappuccino,” Carol said, thrusting the mug at Joy as if both Joy and the delivery man were nothing more than an inconvenience. She strode back to the kitchen with the determined air of ignoring them completely.
“Is she your girlfriend?” Frank asked.
“Gawd, no. She’s my roommate. The current housing shortage facilitated a roommate.”
“Lucky you,” he said. Joy sensed he meant it facetiously. “I’ll be right back with the ottoman.” He left.
Joy sipped her cappuccino, set it on the glass topped coffee table, and followed him out so she could hold the door. It was the least she could do. She had a lot of respect for hard-working people since she spent her life catering to the wealthy and entitled.
She held the door while Frank brought in the ottoman... and ran smack into a woman dressed in a smoking jacket wearing a monocle. She looked like someone out of Radclyffe Hall’s Well of Loneliness novel. It had been the second lesbian novel Joy had ever read, the first being Ruby Fruit Jungle. The third was Curious Wine. As a baby dyke she had been confused as to what kind she of lesbian she would become—reading had helped. She ended up being more femme because of her job, but she had always been on the girly side and Angela had always teased her about it.
“Excuse me, are you all right?” Frank asked, genuinely concerned.
“I’m made of tough stuff; however, I think I shall stay inside as this is an omen of a bad day. I’ve already stepped in cat vomit. My obnoxious feline prefers to do it in direct travel routes. Vomit and an ottoman ramming are enough for one day.” She didn’t say another word walked back upstairs.
“That’s your neighbor?” Frank asked.
“I suppose so. I’ve never met her. There are two apartments upstairs. I wonder what they’re like,” Joy said.
“I can only imagine,” Frank said. They entered the apartment and Frank set the ottoman in front of the chair. “Reading lamp and side table and you’re all set.” He went to get them.
“Is he gone yet?” Carol said, poking her head out of the kitchen. She was still annoyed.
“He’s bringing in the table and the lamp. Why were you so bitchy toward him? He’s just doing his job.”
“Because men always stare at me because I’m like their fantasy. I don’t like men, which is yet another reason I’m a lesbian. And I certainly hope you are, since my gaydar went off; otherwise I wouldn’t let you bring men home.”
“Let me? I pay half the rent and I’ll do as I damn well please,” Joy said, now annoyed herself.
“I don’t want a troupe of men going through here.”
“So now I’m a whore,” Joy said, her face reddening.
“Would you like it if I had a slew of girlfriends going through?”
“What is this, a nunnery?” Joy asked angrily.
“No, all I’m saying is I hope you’re a lesbian. Are you?” Carol said.
“Of course. I wasn’t entirely sure you were one,” Joy said testily.
“Perhaps you should get your gaydar fixed,” Carol said.
“Ugh,” Joy said. “Can you just let me get my stuff in without your approval? Just so you know I’m also expecting an IKEA delivery.”
“You bought new furniture, too?” Carol said.
“You did,” Joy said.
“I left my stuff behind. It was time for a complete do-over,” Carol said.
Everything but the Girl Page 2