“What are you still doing here?” Gigi said, spreading ketchup on her hash browns.
“I was waiting for you,” Caroline said, sitting down in the easy chair.
“Why?”
“I want to talk.”
“I don’t see any purpose in that. You accomplished what you set out to do.”
“Which is?”
“Punishing me and everyone I loved for my one act of cowardice. Now go. I don’t want to see you anymore. I never wanted to see you.”
“That wasn’t what I set out to do,” Caroline replied.
“Sure,” Gigi said, finishing her breakfast.
“I came to tell you I love you,” Caroline said, looking at Gigi’s naked body and remembering happier times.
“Gee, that’s a handy thing. Perhaps you should have thought of that before you ran off, devastated Mallory and made it virtually impossible for me to find you. You’re a little late to be saying that you love me. In fact, you’re fucking pathetic. Now if you don’t mind I’m going to take a shower and then nap, seeing as I just spent the night in jail,” Gigi said, getting up.
Caroline sat and listened to the shower running. She got up and collected Gigi’s clothes and threw them in the trash. She wasn’t going anywhere until she talked to Gigi and told her the story of the last few years—how she had roamed the earth, tried to find love only to disappoint herself and several innocent women. She had come to realize that until she reconciled the past she could not know a future. She would wait.
Taylor sat across the dining room table from her father, looking glum. She played with her pearl onions and peas and hadn’t touched her stuffed pork chop.
“What’s wrong?”
“What makes you think anything is wrong?” Taylor said, avoiding his gaze, knowing he was practically reading her mind.
“Because you seem preoccupied and you haven’t talked about Alex in several days, which makes me think that something extremely important is happening and as your dear old dad that makes me nervous.”
“Well, since there appears no way to avoid your studious psychological intuitions I suppose I will have to tell you,” Taylor replied.
“Only if you want to.”
“You are a smooth one,” Taylor teased.
“So tell and I won’t have to stay up nights worrying about you.”
“Alex broke up with Gigi after a horrendous night in which various episodes of infidelities were revealed and she moved out.”
That’s good. Isn’t it?”
“The problem is I wanted her to move in with me and instead she moved into a friend’s place.”
“Taylor, I don’t think that is necessarily a bad thing. In fact, it is probably for the best. Alex shouldn’t be expected to jump into another relationship having just left one.”
“Somehow, I knew you would say that. I love her and I think she loves me so why can’t we start. I’ve been waiting patiently,” Taylor replied.
“From the sounds of it you’re going to have to continue to be patient if you want this to work. Anything worthwhile is worth waiting for,” her father said, looking sagely over the top of his spectacles.
Taylor sighed heavily, “I know.”
“Now eat your dinner. We’ve got to keep your stamina up.”
“For what?”
“The love thing.”
“Oh, that,” Taylor said, smiling.
Del rolled over in bed and stroked the side of Mallory’s cheek. Mallory nestled in closer, placing her head on Del’s chest and listening to her heartbeat, thinking how exquisitely wonderful life can be. In the early morning their bodies glowed with sweat and were flushed with lovemaking.
“Are you happy?” Mallory asked.
“Right this minute or overall?” Del said.
Mallory slowly moved her hand down Del’s leg and pinched her inner thigh.
“Ouch!”
“I suggest you answer the question properly,” Mallory advised.
“Your behavior is truly indicative of a Catholic school upbringing,” Del teased, remembering their late night talk about childhood and how it had made her feel even closer to Mallory knowing that these secrets were not freely shared with many others.
“Blame it on the nuns,” Mallory replied.
Del took Mallory’s face in her hands and looked deep in her eyes, seeing her own reflection within them.
“I am happy. You make me happy and there is no other place on the planet I’d rather be.”
“What a charming woman you are,” Mallory said.
“Let me show you how charming I can be,” Del said, rolling Mallory on her back.
Mallory smiled and looked at the clock.
“All right but I’ve got to meet Dr. Kohlrabi in an hour,” Mallory said.
Mallory left Del in the shower still panting from her efforts and raced across town to barely make her therapy appointment. The receptionist didn’t stop typing when she came in. She nodded her head toward the door of Dr. Kohlrabi’s office indicating that Mallory could go in. Mallory followed her cue and entered the office.
“You look a little rushed this morning,” Dr. Kohlrabi said, looking up from her notes.
“I got up late,” Mallory said, averting her eyes and wondering if she looked like she had been making love twenty minutes earlier.
“How is Del?”
“She’s fine, lovely in fact.”
“And the two of you are living together? How is that working out?” Dr. Kohlrabi inquired.
“Better than I ever imagined.”
“And that is why I have a brand-new car in the parking garage?”
“Yes, it is. I always keep my promises.”
“Mallory, you can’t give me a car,” Dr. Kohlrabi said.
“Sure I can. Today is my last day of therapy and because you have so diligently stuck by me and essentially brought myself to me, you will have saved me thousands of dollars in additional therapy; thus I consider this an investment in my future,” Mallory said.
“Mallory . . .”
“Besides, I can’t take it back and I already have a car,” Mallory said, taking a hard look around the office, thinking that she had spent a lot of time here.
“You’re sure about this?” Dr. Kohlrabi said.
“Yes, I want to be on my own. I don’t want to always be analyzing and fretting about my life. I’d like to just live it now. I can’t do that and therapy. It has to be one or the other.”
“I don’t want you to consider it a failure if you want to return, and you are welcome to return . . . without charge,” Dr. Kohlrabi said, her eyes getting moist.
“I do have a favor to ask,” Mallory said, getting up.
“Yes,” Dr. Kolrabi replied.
“I’d like to refer a friend,” Mallory said.
“All right,” Dr. Kohlrabi said, digging out a business card and handing it to Mallory. “Who is it?”
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
Dr. Kohlrabi laughed. “You always were such an enigma.”
“Now if it will not violate your professional protocol I would like a hug,” Mallory said.
“Of course,” Dr. Kohlrabi said, getting up from behind her desk.
“You’re short,” Mallory said, taking a good look at the doctor.
“Yes, five foot one to be precise. You’ve never noticed,” Dr. Kohlrabi said, giving Mallory a hug.
“No, your psychological demeanor belies your stature.”
“I will miss your stunning vocabulary. Now you better go before I get mushy and you discover that not only am I short but also embarrassingly emotional.”
“Thank you . . . for everything,” Mallory said.
Dr. Kohlrabi nodded and pushed her red spectacles back up her nose.
When Mallory got to the car she pulled an envelope out of the glove box and scribbled the address. She drove directly to the post office and placed it in the blue collection box, knowing that if she didn’t do it now she would lose her
nerve.
Kim was reading the latest cartoon script while Angel showered. At first it was odd seeing a rendition of yourself in the weekly paper, but Angel was always adamant about having her check the script first to see if it met her approval. Kim thought this was cute and considerate. It seemed foreign to her to have a lover who was kind and loving, yet sexual and passionate. She knew it was a sick and twisted statement about her life albeit true. Being with Angel was the first correct step in what she discerned as the beginning of her life as it should be, not as it had been. Life now had the possibility of being a beautiful experience. She sat glowing with this knowledge, feeling it grow inside her filling up all those empty spaces until she was suddenly full, like the cartoon characters Angel sketched and then inked in to give them complete dimension.
Then she saw the brochures for houses sitting on the desk. She picked up a brochure and looked at the houses circled for perusal. Kim thumbed through the pages trying to figure out exactly what was going on and whether it was Angel that was thinking about moving or one of her many friends.
Angel walked into the room with a towel wrapped around her waist. She peered over Kim’s shoulder.
“What are you looking at?” Angel asked.
“Right now, I’m looking at you,” Kim said, tracing a line down Angel’s flat stomach with her fingertip, which made both of them quiver.
“Do you like what you see?” Angel teased.
“Would it offend you completely if I told you I am in a state of total lust when it comes to your body?” Kim said.
“Well, it is sort of non politically correct, but I think I can get past it.”
“Are you serious?”
“Not really. It is what it is and I’m glad you like it. Now pick a house and move in with me,” Angel said, before she could stop herself. She didn’t want to stop herself but fear and decorum ruled her inner hemisphere with only an occasional foreign body getting through. Moving in with Kim was one such body.
“What?” Kim asked.
“I want to get married and move to suburbia.”
“You don’t really mean that,” Kim asked, getting alarmed. This was more than she had planned on for this evening. They were supposed to be going out to dinner and then to see a movie. Kim wasn’t prepared to decide the fate of their future.
“I’ve been thinking about it for a while now. I know you already have a house but . . . I want to start fresh, to slough off our old selves.”
“Do you have your period?” Kim asked.
“No. Why?”
“Because your behavior is erratic, which could definitely be hormonal.”
“Meaning?”
“You’re not usually this spontaneous. Normally you plan, ponder, discuss and then decide. It’s very methodical.”
“That sounds boring,” Angel said, moving closer to Kim, who sat perched on the stool. She’d show her spontaneous, Angel thought as she took Kim’s leg and wrapped it and then the other around her waist.
Kim raised an eyebrow. “It’s not boring. In fact, it’s a very admirable trait,” she said, as she put her arms around Angel’s neck and softly kissed her. The fluttering butterfly wings of desire that lived in her lower abdomen and upper thighs began to quiver and take flight.
“I want to live together, in our own house,” Angel said, lifting Kim from the stool and carrying her to the bed. Her towel dropped from her waist of its own accord as if agreeing with her decision.
Angel laid her on the bed and inserted herself between her thighs, lowering herself down onto Kim, their two bodies coming together like missing puzzle pieces. As Kim felt Angel taking her she recognized the difference. Before when they made love Kim had always initiated it. Not that it was a bad thing. Angel was a kind and generous lover, but now as she watched Angel’s body rise and fall against her own like waves rolling up onto the shore, their journey brought to fruition only to begin again, Kim knew their separateness had disappeared. Angel exhaled and her body shuddered. Kim ran her fingertip along the vein on Angel’s forehead that only showed itself in times of intensity, passion, anger, and physical exhilaration.
“I would love to live with you,” Kim said.
“You mean it?” Angel said, hoping this was not the postcoital voice of utter submission.
“Yes, but I have one request.”
“Anything.”
“I want you to teach me to play soccer.”
“Really?” Angel said, bewildered that anyone else other than she and her soccer buddies ever thought of the game.
“I know it’s difficult but I’d still like to learn,” Kim said.
“You got it. Now can we look at house brochures?” Angel said, leaping off the bed and making for her stack of real estate advertisements.
“Sure, and then can we get something to eat?”
“You’ll make a fine soccer player, a good appetite is a prerequisite,” Angel said, lying on her stomach, her new life spread before her on the glossy pages of a real estate monthly.
Caroline waited outside Mallory’s house until she saw Del get in her car and pull out of the drive. She felt like a police officer on a stakeout. Right now her whole life felt like a mystery chase involving her younger self and tracking her earlier indiscretions. She had failed to bring Gigi around but she wasn’t giving up.
Someday she would make Gigi understand that she was the love of her life and they should be together. Caroline knew how psychotic this sounded but she had traveled halfway around the world only to discover that the woman she left behind was the only one she needed to fill the seeping void of loneliness that kept spreading across the landscape of her soul creating a dangerous bog that allowed no foot travel. She did not want her emotions to become preserved yet buried in those marshy waters.
She needed to repair the damage of five years ago, and most of it had to do with Mallory. If she could make amends for that, her chances of getting Gigi back were increased tenfold. She took a deep breath and prepared to go into the confessional booth.
Mallory opened the door and Caroline saw the look of complete terror on her face.
“What are you doing here?” Mallory asked.
“I want to explain.”
“I see no reason for that. Now you need to leave.”
“Maybe not for you, but for me it is one of the primary reasons for coming home,” Caroline said, wondering if she would ever get past the threshold.
“I thought Brazil was home,” Mallory said, savagely.
“You know what I mean.”
“I don’t know anything about you, obviously, or I never would have trusted you with something as delicate and vulnerable as my heart.”
“Mallory, we can talk or I am going to camp on your doorstep until you let me in. It’s your choice,” Caroline said, firmly.
“You have exactly five minutes,” Mallory said, thinking she did not want Caroline on the doorstep when Del returned.
“Thank you. How’s your arm?” Caroline asked, noticing her gauze-wrapped forearm.
“Healing nicely. It’ll be one hell of a scar,” Mallory replied, thinking it was the battle wound she’d never had when Caroline left. Now she had it forever marked on her body, a testimony to the morning she woke up to find Caroline packed and leaving.
“You could have died,” Caroline said, her eyelid quivering.
Mallory remembered that quiver. It occurred whenever she felt strongly about something. Mallory had once thought it an endearing personal mannerism. Now it brought back only a rush of painful memories.
“It wouldn’t have been the first time,” Mallory said.
“That’s what I want to talk to you about.”
“And what will you say that would make it better, that would make it go away, that would heal the jagged, gaping hole in my heart. What could that possibly be?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Somehow that seems like you’re offering me a quarter when you owe me ten grand. That doesn’t cut it. I want you to
tell me how, why, when and where. You tell me every torrid detail and I’ll consider letting you walk out of here alive,” Mallory said.
“To what purpose?” Caroline asked.
“So that I can stop imagining what happened and start knowing. You may want closure but I need closure.”
“All right. I will tell you everything,” Caroline said, thinking this must be the final ring of purgatory. If she could confess then maybe she could free herself as well as Mallory.
“Completely uncensored,” Mallory said.
“As uncensored as memory allows,” Caroline said.
“I’ll make tea.”
“Please,” Caroline said, glad for the distraction. It was hard looking at Mallory, remembering the woman she had fallen in love with and then left so abruptly.
Caroline waited for tea and then took a perfunctory sip before she began.
Del saw the car in the drive. It wasn’t one she recognized. She tried not to panic. Anything new or different in their lives was still cause for panic. She tried to take three deep breaths as Mallory in her Buddhist-gone-therapy mode always advised. Mallory hadn’t mentioned anyone coming over and she didn’t usually have anyone over. Home was a sacred place. She walked past the large picture window and something caught her eye. She looked in to see Mallory and Caroline wrapped in an embrace. She stopped. Caroline wiped the tears on Mallory’s face and then kissed her forehead. She said something and Mallory nodded. It took everything Del had not to burst in the house and demand an explanation.
Caroline came out as Del walked in. Del stared at her.
“Hi,” Caroline said. “I was just leaving.”
“You better be,” Del snarled.
“Are you all right?” Del asked, feeling panic take complete hold.
“I’m fine,” Mallory said, trying to get control.
Del held her.
“You’re trembling,” Del said. “I’m going to kill her.”
“Del, wait. Don’t please. I need you right now,” Mallory said, pulling her tighter.
Del kissed her. “I love you and I can’t bear to let anyone hurt you.”
“She only hurt me by telling me the truth I needed to hear,” Mallory said.
Saxon Bennett - Talk of the Town Page 22