The One That Ran Away

by Hildred Billings

  Shannon sagely nodded, as if she had a clue what the hell Jess meant. “You really know a lot about Christianity.”

  “I know a lot about lots of religions. Like you must know a lot about politics.”

  The smile fell off Shannon’s face. “Talk about a degree I haven’t used. After the last election, I totally checked out. Nothing makes sense anymore.”

  Jess couldn’t nod any harder. “Tell me about it.” Nothing. Nothing made sense anymore! Not Shannon walking into her life again. Not her hunting down Jess for reasons unknown. Definitely not discussing the women of the Bible with her.

  It made her wonder how far she could push the topic.

  “You ever hear of Lilith?”

  Shannon furrowed her immaculate brows. “Vaguely.”

  “She’s my favorite religious figure, and she’s not even in the Christian Bible.”

  “Come again?”

  Oh, boy. Jess may have set herself up for this, but Shannon had inadvertently opened a can of worms by questioning Jess’s favorite subject. She could crack her knuckles talking about Lilith.

  “She’s from the Talmud.” When Jess met another quizzical look, she continued, “Ancient Jewish text. I also like to think of her as the first feminist.”

  “Go on.”

  Jess stretched her arms above her head. One of the buttons on her blouse popped open. “She was Adam’s first wife. Before Eve. You know the story of Adam and Eve, right?” That may have been one of the most eye-roll-worthy questions she could’ve asked another American, but Jess rarely knew what to expect anymore. The most unexpected people could rattle off Biblical facts because of their backgrounds and how well-read in Western Literature they were. Others from some of the most religious areas in the nation barely knew who Moses was.

  “Yeah, of course. Apples and snakes.”

  “Riiiight. Apples and snakes.” Jess chuckled. “Anyway, legend says that God made Adam and Lilith separately, both of them from piles of earth in the Garden of Eden. When Lilith was informed that she was to submit to Adam, including being the bottom in all sexual endeavors, she basically screamed in his face, turned into a demonic bat, and flew away to have tons of orgies and beget a billion demon babies. Badass.”

  “Suppose that explains why God made sure to fashion Eve out of a dude’s pelvic bone.”

  Jess cringed. That sounded… painful. “Rib bone.”

  “Right. Ribs.” Shannon pulled her wallet out of her bag and glanced at the line forming at the register. “What happened to her after that?”

  “After what?”

  “After she had a billion demon babies.”

  Shrugging, Jess said, “Nobody can agree. Honestly, she was probably a leftover from assimilated Sumerian myths. There are a lot of similarities between her and another ancient goddess of the time. It’s how religions spread.” Jess looked away. “Guess I sound like a nut talking about this stuff.”

  “Huh? Why? I think it’s cool that you know so much.” Shannon got up. “I’m gonna get a latte. Be right back.”

  Jess remained in her seat and pretended to get back to work. Except how could she, when she swore she embarrassed herself in front of the one woman she never wanted to be embarrassed around? I may be over her, but some habits are hard to break. Jess finished putting her things away, save for her laptop, and shook her head. Really, Jess? Going on about Lilith, of all figures? You might as well scream some more about what a raging dyke you are. Jess would be far from the first lesbian she knew to talk about getting a Lilith tattoo. Any woman screaming at a man that he would never own her became a legendary figure in the gay chat rooms. Next time, go on about Sarah. Or Esther. Literally anyone else.

  “Jezebel,” she muttered. “Fucking Jezebel!”

  A man in the corner of the café slammed his newspaper down and glared at her. She glared right back at him.

  She then looked at Shannon, whose soft hair glided to the front of the line while her delicate hand fished into her wallet and her pretty pink lips politely asked for a mocha latte.

  Don’t fall for it. You wanna talk about a Jezebel? There’s your own right there. No, wait. Shannon wasn’t a Jezebel, another figure demonized throughout history. She was more like a Delilah, waiting to cut Jess where she would hurt the most.

  Or maybe she was Judith, ready to cut someone’s fucking head off!

  Ooh, Judith. There’s a good article to start with. Jess pulled her notebook out and jotted down some words she wouldn’t remember writing later.

  ***

  Memory #13

  My twenty-second birthday was the worst, and it was because of Shannon Parker.

  I went to The Boar’s Head, where she confirmed she would meet me for drinks and maybe a light dinner. We had conversed enough for her to suggest a later meeting time to accommodate one of her group projects for her politics class. I agreed. We could’ve met at midnight for all I cared. As long as we got to meet… that was all that mattered.

  I still don’t drink very much, but that night I treated myself to a Kraken rum and Coke, my favorite combination of drinks to splurge on when I’m feeling frivolous. With my luck, I would have half of it consumed by the time Shannon showed up. I needed the liquid courage to flirt with her… without coming off as trying too hard.

  Early, of course. I had to show up early if it meant getting a drink ahead of time and preparing myself for having private drinks with the woman I’d been in love with for over two years. I don’t want to share how long it took me to pick out my outfit. Nor will I ever forget it. I wore my sexiest pair of jeans and a form-fitting blouse as angelic white as my soul.

  (Yeah, right. It was blood red, like my sinful nature. Or so I wanted to portray myself.)

  The bartender was nice enough to ask me what I was up to that night. When I said I was meeting “a friend” for a birthday drink, he winked at me and told me good luck. Yeah, I knew it. I screamed how gay I was from across the room. It would take a miracle for Shannon to approach me and not feel the serious gay vibes I emanated every time I breathed.

  I waited a long time. Long, long past the time we were supposed to meet.

  I ordered some food to tie me over. With as much alcohol as I was drinking, it became more important for me to have some food the balance it out. Not that I intended to drink so much that night. I still wanted to be clear-headed enough to carry on a casual conversation with my crush. Instead, I was drinking because I knew I had been stood up on my birthday.

  Even if it wasn’t my actual birthday, it still felt like a betrayal. Because Shannon had led me on all week that we would be getting drinks. Now, this? She had toyed with me for so long that I almost believed her when she said we were more than acquaintances.

  I inhaled her second-hand smoke, for fuck’s sake.

  As usual, things were too good to be true. I had gone through most of college without a girlfriend, and I would end it with the keen awareness that I probably would never have a girlfriend.

  Hey, I know it’s common to speak in absolutes when you’re that young, but if you told me I’d make it to thirty and still not have a girlfriend, I’d believe you. And probably drown myself in the shallow campus stream.

  Those were the feelings alcohol brought on. It didn’t help that the bartender rounded back to me around ten o’clock and kindly asked if I wanted to close my tab.

  Yes. No. Mostly, I wanted to throw up.

  I stumbled back to campus with a chip on my shoulder and a hole in my heart. You know, I hadn’t expected a miracle from that night. I didn’t think she would kiss me, touch me, or invite me back to her room for a nightcap and some sexual exploration. But I wanted the hope. Hope that our relationship could blossom into some form of intimacy, even if never sexual.

  Shannon Parker was the kind of woman who pulled on my heartstrings and played them like a harp. It didn’t matter if the melody she played spoke of grand romances and orgasmic reveries. It only mattered that it was a beautiful tune that made people happy.


  To have no melody at all was a travesty.

  ***

  “So, to what do I owe this pleasure?” Jess asked the moment Shannon sat back down again.

  She grinned through her apparent confusion. “Was in the area and decided to see if anyone I knew was around.”

  You’re lying. She had gotten off the streetcar coming from Northwest. Based on how long it took her to get there after finding out where Jess was, odds were she was hanging around Powell’s and had to shit or get off the pot when deciding whether to travel back to Northwest or into Downtown. Even so, Jess wouldn’t call her out. That might spook her. Or it would confirm Jess’s greatest fears.

  That the shoe was on the other foot.

  “You know,” Shannon said, quickly changing the subject, “I would love to check out one of the bike trails around here. My ex-boyfriend was a big cycler. One of our dreams when we moved here was to check out all the trails, but we only got around to one before… before winter came.” She almost said “Before we broke up,” huh? “My friend Kelsey – you remember her, right? – doesn’t like cycling, though she has this perfectly good bike locked up in her apartment. Don’t suppose you might want to go check one of the trails out one day?”

  Jess pursed her lips. “Sorry. Don’t have a bike.” She could only assume that Shannon had a couple death traps on hand, though. Nothing said Shannon Coming Through like a bike built for murder.

  “Oh! I think I have access to a spare. Besides, there are those orange rental bikes that maybe you can take up to…”

  “I don’t know how to ride a bike.”

  There it was. The most sacrilegious thing Jess Mills could say in the city of Portland. Well, maybe besides “Kill all the trees!”

  “Really? Still?”

  “What do you mean still?” Was this a crack at her being thirty and bikeless? Some people never learned to ride bikes! It was normal! Especially if you grew up in the woods like I did. And with an overprotective mother who would rather die of a stroke than watch her only child bike around the cliffs toppling into the ocean. Flat, paved roads were hard to come by in the woods.

  “I mean… weren’t you trying to learn how to ride a bike back in college?”

  “Didn’t really need to, since the campus was so small. Besides, how do you remember something like that?” You couldn’t remember to come meet me at the pub for my birthday?

  “You’re trying to tell me,” Shannon said, the barista bringing over her mocha latte, “that you live in one of the most bike friendly cities in America, and you don’t have a bike? Let alone know how to ride one?”

  Jess shrugged. “Guilty.”

  “We need to fix that.”

  “We do?”

  Shannon grinned again. “Yup, and I know the person to teach you.”

  The part of Jess telling her that this might be one of her dreams come true warred with the side cautioning her that she was better off throwing herself into traffic.

  Chapter 14

  Shannon

  The nice thing about Shannon’s overpriced apartment building was that she had storage space in the cold, dank basement that she shared with the other five units. Most of the transplants from California, New York, and Texas had no need for so much space when the only items they brought with them to Portland were their Persian rugs and grandmothers’ fine china – items that would never, ever go in a communal basement.

  That meant more space for Shannon to use, or at least until the landlord told her to clear it out. More than enough room for her bike – and Andrew’s, which he hadn’t taken with him when he moved out of town.

  It wasn’t a fantastic bike, anyway. He bought it used off Craigslist when a local college kid wanted to dump his main mode of transportation in favor of a car. Andrew had lofty ambitions of being a cycle-muter with the best of Portland’s downtown office workers. “What better way to get exercise and save the environment, Shans!” That’s what he said every time Shannon suggested they might finally get a car, so they could take trips to the coast.

  She hadn’t been lying when she said she wanted to hit some of the trails in and around Portland. She also hadn’t been lying when she expressed surprise that Jess couldn’t ride a bike. It was so second nature to Shannon that she instantly felt it was a problem worth rectifying.

  One of the wheels on Andrew’s old bike spun in her hand. She lowered her screwdriver and complimented herself on a job well done. Sure, she should’ve been hustling for more photography clients, but she would rather enjoy the dreary Oregonian day inside a damp garage instead of canvasing the neighborhoods or attempting online marketing.

  “How about that?” came a male voice from behind her. “I swing by to check on the old bike, and here you are, maintaining it for little old me.”

  The wheel stopped spinning. Shannon continued to stare out the rain-dripped window, pretending she didn’t hear her ex-boyfriend behind her.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I said,” Andrew began, swinging his backpack onto the cement floor and approaching her with a shit-eating grin, “I came to check on my bike.”

  “Thought you’d be down in Eugene, enjoying your new life.” Shannon put her tools away. “Last I heard, you were seeing someone. And you didn’t need a bike anymore.”

  “Are you kidding? Eugene is a huge biking spot. It’s a miracle if you don’t get ran over trying to cross the street.” He knelt beside her. His presence was not comforting. “How goes it, Shan?”

  She gritted her teeth behind her lips. “So?” she asked. “You swing by here to steal your own bike? Thought it was mine now, since you so graciously left it behind.”

  “All right, you got me,” he said with a dramatic sigh. “I didn’t only come up for the bike. I wanted to talk to you, too.”

  “You could’ve texted me, you know. Unfortunately, anything you left behind I’ve donated to charity.” Or thrown out in the dumpster. Whatever worked.

  “Including you?”

  Shannon sat up with a huff. “Excuse me?”

  Now that she was no longer in pretend love with this ass, she could see his stupid grins for what they were. Manipulative, asinine, and useless. “Aw, c’mon, Shan. You know what I mean. We broke up on the wrong foot.”

  Chuckling, she turned away before she could possibly be swayed by that charming smile. “You drove all the way up here from Eugene to ask me to get back with you?”

  He followed her halfway across the basement. “I’ve got this great apartment in Eugene. Near the campus, with every amenity you could want a ten-minute bike ride away.” He opened his arms in invitation. “Beautiful views of the river. Two bedrooms for the same price of what we pay for here.”

  Shannon snorted. So, the bastard was still overpaying for housing? Not surprising. He had sucked her in with his delusions of living in the hippest, trendiest area wherever they went. Well, they couldn’t afford a studio in the Pearl District, but they had scrounged enough for a one-bedroom in Northwest. Close enough!

  “Can we at least talk?”

  Shannon stopped at the foot of the stairs leading up to the sidewalk. The only reason her ex made it down into the basement without a key was because she foolishly left the door propped. Stupid mistake, huh? What if some wackjob came down here instead? Might have been preferable to this asshole stalking her.

  “Talk about what?” she asked. “You broke up with me and moved on. There’s nothing to talk about.” She turned toward him anyway. “Or did you not hear my assertion that you were seeing someone else now?”

  “Ah…” He sheepishly scratched his head. “There might’ve been someone until recently,” Andrew admitted, “but it wasn’t serious. You know how it is. Fresh from a breakup, time for a rebound. That’s all she was!”

  Rolling her eyes, Shannon ascended the stairs and entered the misty world of Glisan Street. “Right. You’re really winning me back here, Andrew. Besides,” she would greatly enjoy this part, especially since her voic
e had that nice, echoing timbre in the stairwell, “who says I’m not seeing someone right now?”

  “Well, I mean…” Aw, were his cheeks a nice shade of apple red? “We can talk about that. You know I’m an open-minded guy.”

  She rounded on him the moment he reached the top of the stairs. “Are you kidding me? What kind of crack are you smoking down in Eugene, Andrew? Do you think I’m some desperate slut who is aching to take you back? Guess again! I know when I’m not wanted!”

  “Shannon, c’mon…”

  Was this really happening? Shannon had planned a nice day at home with her cat and a computer full of photography in need of Photoshopping. Her sojourn into the basement was her break from work. Seriously! This was what she got when she tried to move on with her life?

  “You’re an ass, Andrew. For your information, I have moved on. And, yes, there is someone else now! I can hop into someone else’s bed as quickly as you!”

  She marched down the street, fists pumping the rest of her body until anyone passing her had no choice but to jump out of her way. A few wayward tourists blanched to see her head of hair bouncing toward them, powered by nothing but her spite for the man chasing after her.

  “What kind of guy are you shacking up with now, Shan?”

  She stopped long enough to turn around and shout, “Who said it was a guy?”

  Yeah, that felt good. Shannon had spent over three years listening to that guy not-so-coolly suggest they have a threesome with another girl. Shannon had always turned him down under the pretense that she would not be comfortable “sharing” him with another girl. In truth, she knew that she would not be comfortable with any girl in the same bed as her.

  Because whenever she thought about being with a woman, only one came to mind.

  ***