by Erinne Bates
When dinner was finally over, Justine stayed to help my mom with the dishes while I went to my room. I don’t know why I didn’t stay and help clean up. I just wanted to sneak away and be alone with her. I sat on my bed and waited.
When Justine finally tapped on my door before peeking inside, I knew the evening would not go as I had hoped.
“I’ve got some work to do. When you are ready for bed, will you come into my room?” she asked, lingering in the doorway. I only nodded, feeling the familiar knot form in my stomach. I had already forgotten what it was like when our visits were sporadic and unpredictable. I didn’t want to go back to that time of feeling insecure and unsure of what to say. I waited for two hours, then I knocked lightly on her bedroom door, in case she was on the phone.
Justine was sprawled out asleep across her bed when I stepped inside her room. I stared at her body, remembering my mouth discovering every inch. She was so beautiful to me. I removed her pants and was able to get her to put on a fresh tee shirt to sleep in. I switched off the lamp and slid behind her, pressing every part of my body against hers. Justine took my hand and guided it to the wetness between her legs. She cried out into her pillow when she came, digging her nails into my wrist. The next morning I hid the bruised cuts from her nails with an oversized old watch that didn’t even work.
School that day was like dry toast. My classes and even my friends were mundane, tiresome, tedious. I couldn’t wait for the day to end. I knew when I got home I could have a couple of hours alone with Justine before my parents came home from work. Even then my mom would only change her clothes and head straight for the barn to ride Brie. When the final bell rang I sped home as fast as I could. I didn’t care that I had left my books on my desk and would fail a test that was scheduled for the next day.
I smiled when I saw Justine’s car outside the house as I pulled up. The house was very quiet when I entered, which was not unusual. I had hoped to be greeted at the door with kisses, but I also knew that Justine would most likely be in her room making calls or even sleeping. I just loved finding her asleep. I would say stupid things to her to bring her awake, like, “There’s a big flood downstairs and so we’ll need to canoe through the house to get to the garage.” She’d always respond with, “Ok that sounds lovely,” or “Get the ponies out.” Expecting to find a shut door when I approached the top of the stairs, I saw that the door to her room was open.
“Hello?” I called out. There was no answer so I went to my room to change out of my school clothes. An envelope was laying on my bed on top of some folded shirts. I knew in my gut it was just a note telling me she had to leave for a few days. I prayed it was only overnight. I remembered her telling me she would be gone within weeks so I was not expecting to read what I did.
My Little Lamb,
I am glad you are not here to see the tears that are falling as I write this letter to you. I don’t believe I could bear having to say goodbye to your face. Believe me when I say it would destroy me.
The man I was replacing has come into a conflict and was forced to end his contract weeks earlier than scheduled. What this means is my contract has now been activated so that I may fill his spot sooner rather than later. It is not an action I wished to take, but the circumstance called for immediate response and that is what I agreed to as part of the terms of my own contract.
What we share will never be tainted by time. I want you to know I have struggled with the idea of giving all of this up to share a life with you. Last night, it became clear to me that I would. I must first honor my contract and fulfill the duties I have promised. When it is done, I hope there will be something for us to re-discover.
When you said to me at the beach ‘this is real,’ something inside realized I wanted to be with you more than anything else. I will cling to your words for comfort in our absence. You have no idea the peace you bring me. Your tender acts, your meaningful gestures. You are real to me, and please never forget that yes, what we share is very real.
I have left a note for your wonderful parents. Obviously it says something slightly different. I left a few of my shirts for you and I took from your closet the one you wore the first time we kissed. I hope you don’t mind. You are my first love. My breath. My beating heart. I don’t expect you to wait for me, but please know I will always hope. Yours in every way, J. xxx
My eyes were blurred by tears before I even finished reading the note. Justine was gone. She was gone. I started to tear the note in rage and anguish but quickly put tape over the rip I had made down the center. She said she loved me. I believe she did love me. I read the letter again. Deep down I too was glad I had not been there to see her leave. It would have been far worse.
I returned to my car and drove to a small private beach that was not too far from my home. It was a little gem that was rarely occupied. I sat in the sand and smoked from the pack of cigarettes Justine had left in my car. I cried, and for a time I was close to hysterical. I sat there until the sun went down and the unseen little bugs began to bite and sting. When I went home, my parents were waiting in the living room with their note from Justine in hand. I was barely able to acknowledge their own disappointment they felt at her unexpected departure. I escaped to my room and buried my sobs in my pillows until I fell asleep.
Chapter 9
On the day I turned twenty-two I visited a few close friends from my university then took a bottle of cheap fruity wine to the pond that Justine had taken me to the night she offered my toes to the turtles. It had become the place I went to when I wanted to feel close to her.
Even though four years had passed it was still easy to recall the pain of her absence. Mostly I had given up hope of ever seeing her again, but every now and then I would daydream about the things I held most dear about her. Her laugh. It was always present in her voice. Her scent. Her taste. I could remember all of it when I took the time.
The first two years that she was gone were difficult. I wrote her letters every week at first but rarely mailed them, as I hardly knew where to find her. She wrote four times in those first two years. Then nothing after. When I did not hear from her on my twenty-first birthday I deliberately let go. I moved on as best as I could, but whenever I had a bad day, I would sit at the pond and draw or write until I felt better. It was easy to feel her presence there, and when I needed comfort, I went to her.
The letters she did send were thoughtful, but never gave me the depth of emotion I craved to feel. I tried hard not to over-analyze them and told myself she gave all she could offer. Sometimes, when I imagined her competitive nature and drive, I felt insecure. I did not know what it was like to work toward something with relentless passion in an environment where there was no room for less than perfection. I even feared I would never truly fit in her world. Not in a long-term sense. I imagined that even if she had come back as promised it wouldn’t take long before she lost interest in me. And, I did not want to compete with the men who were constantly trying to get close to her. It was easy to understand why they desired her, but I did not have the confidence to look away while she played the necessary social games with them. Eventually, someone would come along who could offer her the world, if she was willing. I believed she would someday be willing.
Chapter 10
I was celebrating my twenty-fifth birthday with a friend at a lesbian dive bar called Veronica’s when I met Elise. It was the first time I had taken initiative to introduce myself to someone and ask them out, rather than wait for them to take an interest in me. She was eight years older than me, highly confident, and incredibly attractive. I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her the moment we were introduced. She took my breath away when I thought that would never happen to me again.
We bought a home together within our first year. She was a teacher and I was just beginning my career as a freelance writer, and I have to say it was the most joyful time in my life. Elise and I were madly in love. Even my mother liked her. Mom and I had gone through a rough patch when
I began college and I told her I was a lesbian, but she liked Elise and welcomed her into the family. My stepfather had left my mother for another woman, also while I was in college, so my mother was single at that time. I had even stopped going to the pond. For the first three years, life with Elise was perfect.
Two days after my twenty-eighth birthday, my phone rang.
“Hel-lew?”
There was only one person I knew who said ‘hello’ that way.
“It’s you,” I felt caught between a cold sweat and finding something valuable I had lost many years ago.
“You’ll never guess where I am.”
There was a hint of mischievousness in Justine’s tone and I could see the corners of her lips turned up as she spoke into the receiver. I took a step backwards and scanned the front lawn from the living room window.
“I don’t know,” I said over the sound of my heart pounding in my ears.
“I’m at your mum’s home. She’s just left. Can you come?”
I arrived at my mom’s home in less than fifteen minutes. Justine was waiting on the back porch staring in the direction of my old banyan tree.
“Hi,” I said, afraid to see her face. I averted my eyes just as she turned around.
She hugged me tightly, then kissed both of my cheeks. There was nothing dramatic or emotional about our conversation. I felt as though I was in a controlled environment - one that she created. She linked her arm through mine as we talked while standing under the tree I spent countless youthful hours in, writing of an imagined great love. She told me of her husband and son, and surprisingly I still felt as though my heart was tearing inside, but I pretended to be happy and interested. Then, with a change in the direction of the wind, she asked me about myself.
“I have a house,” I told her. “And someone.”
Justine’s face lit up with curiosity.
“Tell me who,” she demanded, pinching my arm playfully.
“It’s a woman,” I confessed. I felt her arm tense in mine.
“Does your mom know?” She directed us away from the tree and back toward the house.
“Yes,” I answered, “She likes this one.”
“There’ve been others?” Justine asked, holding my arm with both of her hands then, as we returned to the porch and took seats on the wooden Adirondack chairs. I did not like the distance between them so I slid mine closer to hers and was inwardly glad when she rested her hand on the arm of my chair.
“Just one other. But she was… it didn’t work out,” I said, not caring to talk about someone unimportant. I wanted to bring up our relationship instead. That’s what I waited impatiently to talk about, but in the moment I worried it was nonexistent. I feared if I brought up our time together, I would be met with a counterargument or worse, told it was never what I thought.
“So- “Justine continued to ask about Elise, though I had not given Justine her name, “ – your mother—she is ok with this one now?” I nodded as years of feelings of anger and hurt and wondering came rushing up. Justine must have noticed as she put her hand on my forearm.
“You look like you have a lot of feelings about this –“
“Don’t!” I interrupted yanking my arm out from under her hand. “Don’t you talk about it. I’m not ready to talk about any of it with you,” my voice was trembling. I wasn’t sure why those were the words that came from my mouth when it was the exact opposite of how I really felt. I resisted the urge to yell at her and blame her for not being there, for breaking my heart, for everything painful that happened after she left.
“Can we go inside?” she asked, rising from her chair and expecting me to do the same. I followed her in, where she directed me to sit on the couch. She disappeared into the kitchen and came back with a glass full of lemonade she found in the refrigerator and handed it to me.
“I don’t know how to tell you…” Justine began. I could hear the sadness in her tone, but I could not acknowledge it. She sat on the floor in front of me. “I don’t know how to tell you what I went through without you,” she went on. I kept my eyes fixed on a spot on the carpet so I wouldn’t look at her face. I forbade myself to cry in front of her. I didn’t want to feel the way I did but I trembled with rage brought on by grief and years of unanswered questions. Despite what I felt, I also was certain I didn’t want her to go away.
“Every night you were the last thought in my head before I went to sleep,” I heard her say.
“I shouldn’t have believed you,” I said shaking my head.
“What do you mean?”
“I shouldn’t have believed that you felt the same for me as I did for you,” I said hearing the resentment in my own voice.
“How could you say that?” Justine asked, her voice cracking. She cleared her throat quickly.
“Why should I think any differently?” I demanded, letting my voice rise. “And you proved it all to me by getting married anyway.”
Justine’s mouth opened. I could see her eyes wetting, and I fought the urge to take her into my arms and beg her forgiveness.
“You left me,” she said in a near whisper as though she’d lost the strength to speak.
“Deny everything! See if I care!” I yelled. “I’ve already been broken because of you. You can’t hurt me again.” I seethed.
Justine’s chin trembled as a tear fell.
“I shouldn’t have come,” she said quietly then stood. She stared at me, but I kept my place on the couch and found a different spot to stare at. The glass in my hand was shaking. Justine started for the door.
“When your mother told me on the phone to stop calling, I did because it was what you wanted. I can’t take that rejection from you again, Calli. It nearly destroyed me the first time.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, half aggravated by such a ridiculous comment.
“Please… I don’t want to argue.”
I leapt from the couch and blocked her path to the door. “Justine, what are you saying? Did you just say my mom told you not to call?”
“Just before I finished the tour,” she said with a weakened voice. “She said never to contact you again- that you had told her to tell me that. I sent so many letters after—"
“What? No!” I grasped both of her hands and held them against my chest. “No, Justine, I swear to you I never dreamt of saying such a thing! There were no letters! My god, I fucking loved you…” I threw myself into her arms and held her tightly, begging her to believe me. I couldn’t bear that she thought she was the one who had been rejected all these years.
With the truth out, we attempted to sort through the events that had occurred behind both of our backs. My mom had discovered the nature of our relationship and lied to Justine to keep her away from me. All along Justine had suffered just as I had. I told her of my visits to the pond and how it had been my only source of comfort.
“Come to my hotel,” she said nearly an hour later. Her eyes were swollen from tears, as I am certain mine were. It made sense that she did not want to be there when my mom returned. Nor did I. “Can you spend the night?”
I froze. Had we simply gone upstairs to my old room and made love I doubt I would have given Elise a prior thought.
“Um-“
“You can decide later. Let’s just leave here,” Justine continued, urging me to get up. We were giggling like secret escape artists by the time we bolted from the house to our cars. I followed her to the Hyatt downtown, and then to her room.
“You’re here alone?”
I stood in the doorway. It hadn’t occurred to me until the moment I stepped foot in her hotel room that her husband and child might be there. I feared meeting them. I even despised it.
“Yes,” Justine answered. “They left this morning.”
She walked over to where I was, still at the door. Taking my hand, she led me inside. Her lips softly touched my right cheek, lingering. Then she held them to my left cheek, though they brushed the corner of my mouth. I could feel her hands sl
owly slide up my arms. With our foreheads pressed together, I closed my eyes and drew in the scent of her breath while her mouth waited next to mine.
“If we do this,” she said softly, her lips just missing mine as she spoke, “it will be the only time.”
I knew what she was saying. I inhaled to clear my mind of my own life outside that room, then, I unbuttoned her blouse. When I slid my hand inside her bra and cupped her breast, I felt the hardening of her nipple against my palm. With every breath, every move, every spoken word, we healed each other. It was spiritual, physical, mystical… it was enlightenment. And when I came, she told me she loved me.
At the first light of the morning, Justine drew the curtains back then ordered a large breakfast for two from room service.
“Will you stay on with me today?” she asked, pouring coffee for me.
“I’d love to,” I said, stretching my arms over my head. I stared at her, busying herself with papers and folders she had produced from one of the drawers. I couldn’t believe she was right there in front of me.
“I changed my flight to tomorrow morning.”
“Wonderful.”
Justine looked back at me from her papers. “Are you sure it’s ok?”
Elise knew just about everything there was to know about Justine. She knew she had been my first love. My first broken heart. My first awareness of many things. It’s hard for others to understand this about Elise, but she was the type of person who, when we walked into a room, would take hold of my hand and whisper in my ear that everyone was looking at me and that she absolutely loved it.
She was the kind of woman Cigar Aficionado would have featured on their magazine cover. She was smoking hot and her ego was just as hot as she was. She was a natural leader who didn’t measure her self-worth by the approval of others. Not that she didn’t like attention. If there was a circle of men (or women) standing around talking, she’d much prefer to walk through them than around them. I watched it happen a dozen times. One thing Elise was not, was jealous. So when I had called to let her know Justine was in town and I was planning on staying with her for a couple of days, she hardly blinked. I know she never expected me to betray her.