Amanda was unable to resist a honk of laughter, but her anger quickly reasserted itself. “By the look of them, I don’t think they were thinking about boldly going where none had gone before. It looked like a pretty well-worn route to me.”
“Jeez. How ghastly. How hilarious. How extraordinary. I think we need drinkies; lots of drinkies. Shall I meet you at Therapy?”
Amanda hesitated then burst into laughter. “Absolutely. See you there at six thirty?”
“Beaut. On the knocker; and not a minute later. Ooooh! This is all too amazing. Now don’t forget to call your mom, okay? Bye, darling.” And he was gone, leaving Amanda feeling better than she had all day.
Although he was Australian and therefore a bit strange, and Amanda had known him only four years, Malcolm was the dearest person in her life and she was instantly looking forward to his affectionate company and comfort. How he could be related to the awful Clancy was a source of continuing disbelief.
She tapped out the numbers for her mother, and waited while the out-of-area clicks and dings happened. Eleanor picked up on the second ring with a businesslike “Heron Creek, how may I help you?”
“Mom—it’s me.” Amanda swung her legs up on her desk, crossed her ankles and leaned back in her chair in preparation for a long session of maternal interrogation.
“Darling, what’s wrong? Are you ill?” Eleanor’s concern was immediate.
“No, Mom, why would you think that?” Amanda stretched and closed her eyes, feeling suddenly weary.
“Because you never call me when you’re at work unless something’s wrong. Actually, you’ve never called me from work.”
“Really? I call you often.” Amanda felt the beginnings of a pout.
“Darling, this isn’t a ‘why don’t you call your mother’ conversation,” said Eleanor and Amanda heard a wisp of exasperation in her tone. “I’m simply concerned because—well, I’ve just explained. Now, how are you? What’s happening?”
“I’m okay, Mom. I’m not at work. I’m at home. I was fired this morning and I’m breaking up with Natalie.”
“Goodness me,” said Eleanor and her normally low-pitched voice rose half an octave. “Good Lord,” she went on. “Are the two things related? I can’t quite see the connection.”
Despite the underlying pain, Amanda laughed. “There isn’t really a connection.” She paused and considered for a second, then went on, “Well, not a connection I want to go into here anyway. Most important thing is I wanted to tell you I got fired because eFrères might be on TV tonight. I didn’t want you to find out like that.”
“That’s thoughtful of you, darling. Thank you!” Amanda didn’t like the surprise in Eleanor’s voice but bit her tongue. Her mother’s voice was warm and back to its usual place on the register when she continued, “I suppose it’s all to do with this awful Lehman’s business, although I don’t really understand why one greedy bank should affect everything else.”
“It’s not quite like that, mom. Basically everything’s going to hell along with subprime and derivatives.”
“I thought that’s what you’ve been doing…I thought you said it was brilliant.”
Amanda wriggled uncomfortably and screwed her eyes shut, recalling how she had belatedly read Clancy’s book and seen—but not believed—what was about to happen. Exactly what she did—had done—at work was not what she wanted to discuss with her mother at this moment. In the past it had always led to arguments with Eleanor refusing to see what a great system it was for making money.
“It’s too boring to explain on the phone, Mom, and…” Amanda stopped, hearing her own voice sounding unpleasantly whiny. She sat up and straightened her shoulders. “Actually, sorry Mom, it’s not boring, it’s devastating and to be honest, I don’t quite understand what’s happening. As soon as I figure it out you’ll be the first to know.”
“Very well, darling.” Eleanor sounded unconvinced. “Now what about Natasha?”
Amanda smiled. “Natalie, Mom, Natalie. That old joke of yours is a bit worn out.”
“Sorry, darling.” Eleanor did not sound repentant. “So what’s happened with Natalie?”
Amanda blew out a deep breath and relaxed her shoulders with deliberation. “It’s a sorry tale, Mom, that’s for sure, but basically I’ve called it a day. We’re just…” She sighed, feeling both foolish and at a loss. As so often happened, Eleanor rescued her.
“Never mind, darling,” her mother said gently. “As long as you’re okay. Would you like to come home for a few days?”
Tears pricked Amanda’s eyes and a lump formed in her throat. “What have I done to deserve you, Mom?” she asked.
From deepest Connecticut Eleanor’s laughter was genuine. “I have no idea, darling, but you’re stuck with me, so who cares? How about it? I have to persuade Thomas Cat he needs his tangles attended to and you’re the only one he doesn’t try to disembowel.”
Amanda smiled as she pictured the cantankerous silver gray tabby Maine coon. He had mysteriously loved her since arriving at the inn as a snarling ten-week-old ball of spit and fluff and the feeling was mutual.
“That’s settled then, Mom, I’ll get the train up on the weekend probably, if that’s okay.”
“Why wait for the weekend? You’re not working,” Eleanor pointed out, and Amanda’s stomach lurched at the plain truth of it.
* * *
Natalie’s key scratched in the lock just after five. Amanda heard the sound as she crossed the living room to the kitchen. She stopped and waited for her to enter. Her heart was thumping in her chest and the churning mix of emotions was impossible to decipher. She was not long out of the shower and wrapped in her rose pink waffle cotton bathrobe; she pulled it more securely around her body and tightened the tie belt, unwilling to be open or vulnerable to Natalie.
“Uh, hi, Amanda,” Natalie muttered as she caught sight of her. “I guess you’re pretty pissed at me.” It was a statement more than a question. Amanda said nothing as she wondered whether she was pissed, sad or…what? She carefully looked at Natalie as if closer examination would offer clues into this unknown person who had shared her life and living space for so long. Natalie shifted uncomfortably and as Amanda became conscious that she was staring, she moved to one of the sofas and sat down.
“You mad at me, Amanda?” Natalie perched on the arm of the opposite sofa. She was fidgeting with her keys and her left knee jiggled. She was clearly nervous.
So she damn well should be, Amanda thought, but still said nothing because she could not, at that moment, think of an adequate response.
“You gonna do the ol’ silent routine?” Natalie’s voice was a little more belligerent and she slid off the arm of the sofa and into the seat. She leaned forward, elbows on knees and peered at Amanda across the coffee table.
“Do I do the ol’ silent routine?” Amanda asked, surprised. “I wasn’t aware of that, I’m sorry.”
Natalie dropped her keys on the table with a clatter and sat back, impatient and irritated. “You know what I mean. I’m like figuring are you talking to me or what?”
Amanda studied Natalie’s agitated face for a second then shook her head. “I’m not sure what to say, to be honest. What do you want me to say?”
“Me? I’m like at a disadvantage here. What the hell do you want me to say?”
Amanda shrugged. “I have no idea. You could try telling me what you were up to this morning. Aside from the obvious.”
Natalie sighed gustily and flung her arms out along the back of the sofa. “You gonna be bourgeois about that?”
Amanda smiled, despite an instant spasm of irritation. “I’m curious. But, come to think of it, I have the right to be curious. You were fucking a strange woman in my apartment with the silliest equipment I’ve ever seen. I think you were making a porn movie—unless it was an artwork that you’ll really have to explain to me. I think I can ask for an explanation, I don’t believe curiosity is an act of bourgeois revisionism.”
; “You’re jealous!”
Amanda managed to laugh. “It was purple, for heaven’s sake! She’d been doing her hair with peroxide for decades. I’m aesthetically offended.”
Natalie’s eyes narrowed to glittering slits and her knee jiggled ever more frantically. “And now you’re puttin’ me down.”
Amanda glanced at her watch and stood up. “Replay your video, Nat, you were putting yourself down with that…that thing waving around and that mask! Were you supposed to be a werewolf or a rabid whippet? Is it Halloween Goes Porno?”
“You think you are so damn smart,” Natalie snarled. She sat back on the sofa, her long legs wide apart, her arms spread along the back of the seat. Unconsciously she was offering herself in a way that Amanda would once have found highly arousing. But no more; that recognition made Amanda feel sad and at the same time gentle toward her.
“Nat, tell me what you were doing. Tell me what you’ve been up to lately,” she said softly. “I don’t get it.”
Natalie sneered and rolled her eyes; her right knee was jigging frantically. “Now you wanna know what I do—that’s rich. When have you been interested in what I do?”
Amanda sighed and it was her turn to roll her eyes. “Okay, I know I’ve been stupid busy this last year, but you don’t tell me anything and…”
“You never ask!” Natalie yelled. “You’re so damn caught up in counting your money and making more and more—what the hell d’you think I’m supposed to do?”
Amanda was taken aback by Natalie’s obvious resentment and thought back over the events of their past year. It didn’t take long.
“I don’t have time to argue the finer political points with you right now, I’m going out.” She stood up, but Natalie’s bellow stopped her dead.
“Don’t you fuckin’ walk away from me, bitch!” Natalie yelled, her face flushed beet red, the furious stain spreading up her usually pale neck.
Amanda looked at her in sheer amazement then said, quietly, “Don’t speak to me like that, Natalie. Just don’t.” And she continued on into the bedroom with as much dignity and calm as she could muster. She walked into her closet and switched on the lights. She pulled a fresh pair of J Brand bootleg jeans from their hanger, chose a charcoal, chunky knit, silk-lined blouson jacket and a black, silk-knit skivvy and finally, picked a pair of spike-heeled, red suede ankle boots from their shelf and tucked them under her arm.
“So who’s the chick?” Natalie’s voice was sharp from the doorway where she leaned, casually blocking Amanda’s exit. “Where d’you think you’re going?”
Amanda took a deep breath and deliberately relaxed her shoulders as she fished in her underwear drawer for pink fine cotton boxers, a bra and a pair of super-thin socks.
“Not that I have to explain to you, but there’s no chick. I’m having a drink with a friend,” she said evenly. She turned and looked at Natalie, whose left foot had now taken over from her knee in a rhythmic fidget. “Look, Nat, I really don’t want to talk to you right now. I have a lot on my mind and I’m not up for it.”
Natalie flicked back a tousled lock of gleaming auburn hair and her expression was scornful. “A lot on your mind, huh? Like being super critical, as usual? Like making me feel stupid? Huh?”
Before she could stop herself Amanda retorted, “You don’t need me to make you feel stupid, Natalie, you do a really good job of that all by yourself.” She was rewarded by a shriek of rage and Natalie advanced, fists raised, blood pumping in a vein in her neck, to grab Amanda by a handful of her hair. For a long minute they wrestled in the confines of the closet. With great difficulty Amanda stood her ground and willed herself to stifle a yell as Natalie tugged on her hair and banged Amanda’s forehead with her own. The sudden pain was not as bad as the instant dizziness as Amanda saw stars and stumbled against her snarling lover. Natalie’s burning eyes and pinpoint black pupils told her that molten anger was about to burst out, and a clench of fright grabbed at her heart.
“Let me go, Nat.” Amanda’s voice was as calm as she could manage, but to her own ears it was tremulous. She tried not to resist Natalie’s grip while at the same time regaining her balance and pulling away from the furious face. Natalie suddenly let go of the hank of hair and shoved Amanda hard, with both hands, against the closet door. The handle caught Amanda between the ribs and she gasped in pain and instinctively held her hands before her face as Natalie advanced and cuffed at them, knocking away the poor protection and slapping the unprotected face, one-two, with the back of each hand. She sneered as Amanda spread her fingers in a gesture of surrender and supplication and reeled back again.
“Natalie, don’t hit me and please let me go.” Amanda’s voice had given up on calm, but she was determined not to cry. “I’m sorry I said that, it was uncalled for. But I really don’t want to talk or fight with you.” She willed her hand to stay away from her forehead although she really wanted to rub the throbbing bump on her forehead and the smarting pain where Natalie’s rings and knuckles had caught her cheekbones.
After a moment’s indecision between them, Amanda took a deep breath and stepped purposefully toward her explosively angry girlfriend and the doorway, her heart thumping, her mouth dry as she went on: “The main reason I have a lot on my mind is nothing to do with you. Actually, I was fired this morning.”
Natalie’s mouth fell open and she automatically stepped back so that Amanda could pass her, and then followed her out of the closet. Amanda dropped her clothes on the bed and her boots on the floor beside it. Conscious of her nakedness and vulnerability, she turned away as she pulled on her boxers, then the jeans, before dropping the bathrobe. She leaned into a pink lacy bra, fumbled behind her back for the clasp, managed to make the connection and shrugged her breasts into the cups. She pulled the skivvy over her head and tucked it into the jeans. Keeping her eyes away from Natalie, she sat on the bed and wiggled her feet into the socks, then the boots, fastened the ankle straps and rose. Instantly she towered over Natalie who still stood, gaping, at the foot of the bed.
“What do you mean ‘fired’?”
“Fired as in fired—let go, retrenched, downsized, sacked, dismissed, given the heave-ho, the unwanted envelope. Um,” Amanda paused, thinking that she’d already pretty much got the list down pat, then frowned and went on, “Got my marching orders, got the ax. How’s that?”
“Sheesh! Wow. So like who’s gonna pay the bills?”
Amanda turned and stared; it was her turn to be open-mouthed. “Well, well,” she whispered, her voice hushed in wondering disbelief. “Is that really the first thing that comes into your head, Nat?”
“I’m an artist but I’m practical too,” Natalie said plaintively. “You can’t expect me to support you.”
Amanda smiled, without humor. “I certainly cannot, Natalie. Ain’t that the truth.” She rummaged in her bureau drawer and found an overlong red and gold paisley patterned silk scarf, wrapped it twice around her throat and adjusted it so the ends hung loose and uneven.
“Excuse me,” she said to a clearly bemused Natalie and made for the bathroom and her makeup shelf. Her routine was simple: kohl-rimmed eyes, glittery bronze-brown eye shadow in the creases of her eyelids, a flick of mascara on her already long dark lashes, bronze blusher brushed onto her cheekbones, a slick of creamy red Dior lipstick and a dab of moulding goop through her hair with her fingertips to lift and give it her favorite windswept look. Finally, she dabbed her wrists and throat pulse points with perfume and the air filled with the scent of ylang-ylang and jasmine. Amanda breathed deeply, it was a rich scent that she had always liked a lot but now it felt heavy, almost overpowering. Might be time for a change, to something lighter. She checked her reflection in the mirrored wall of the bathroom. Each element was nicely combined to finish off her smart-casual, lipstick-lesbian-night-out look. Amanda surveyed herself and was satisfied. It was as funky as she ever got, in a smooth, sophisticated way; definitely not corporate but neither was it rough. She liked it.
*
* *
“We can talk in the morning,” she said to Natalie, who still stood watching her with uneasy eyes. “I may not be late getting home, but I really don’t know. And we do have to talk. We can’t go on like this.” She shrugged her way past Natalie and took a small, long-strapped purse from the selection in the bottom drawer of her bureau, flipped the strap over her head and one arm so it sat diagonally on her hip. Into it went her billfold, a couple of credit cards and the lipstick. She slipped into the chunky cardigan jacket and ensured that the purse was tucked away from view beneath its folds. Still Natalie stared, as if struck dumb.
Amanda carefully teetered out of the bedroom on the high-heeled boots, giving herself time to get used to the change from her cushion-soft Nikes. In the living room she retrieved her keys, remembered the newly charged iPhone and slipped both into the purse. Natalie followed her like a spanked puppy and, as Amanda made for the door, she seemed to suddenly shake herself awake. “Hey, wait a minute, I’m like this is so weird, man, you can’t just walk out on me!”
Amanda stopped at the door and steadily looked at the obviously astonished Natalie.
“I’m not walking out, I’m going out. And now you need to figure out what you’re up to. Unfortunately, I think you’re right, I really mind what I saw this morning. And it’s not the sex part, although I’m old-fashioned enough to not like it, it’s more that you’ve been lying to me and playing me for a sucker. I really don’t like that one bit. But if we’re honest, we don’t love each other and we’re not even in lust anymore.”
Natalie peered at her, left knee jiggling nervously again. “So what are you saying?”
Amanda frowned, wondering what it was she had said that could be so unclear. “I’m saying, I’ve had enough of this relationship. What I saw this morning was the last straw. I’m not turned on by being hit and I’ve realized I’m not into cheating either.”
“Not into cheating?” Natalie spluttered. “Wow, that’s rich coming from someone who spends every waking minute cheating the system and cheating people out of millions—billions! Only it’s called subprime, so that’s okay.”
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