Little Disquietude

by C. E. Case

  Leah didn't quite make eye contact with Adam. She looked at Ward, instead, as he went through his breathing exercises. His face loosened, his expression became more vulnerable. He dampened his lips.

  "After that, fried chicken," Adam said.

  "Finger-licking good," Ward said.

  Leah was scandalized.

  Ward sighed. "Yankees."

  "Overture!" Adam shouted.

  The conductor raised his hands.

  Leah knew where to stand, where to walk, when to sing. She focused on Ward with her heart and her mind and let her body's autopilot take over. She missed a few cues, and stepped on Ward's lines, and forgot one, but no one interrupted her, or corrected her, or cajoled her. The music led her into scenes, and she sang, how she sang, looking at the conductor or with her eyes closed and Ward's arms around her waist. The microphone crackled, but no one stopped her from speaking. Adam just wrote a note on his pad. The fourth song's backdrop didn't fall, so they sang without it.

  She was so relieved to sing the last song that her legs stopped hurting and her throat stopped hurting. Euphoria filled her. Ward sang his last song to her while she stood in the wings, meeting his eyes. She cried.

  Ward had to turn away, because he was losing his voice to emotion.

  "Brava," Adam said, after they'd finished curtain call. "If you do it with that much passion on opening night, no one will notice that it stinks."

  "Fabulous," Ward said.

  "Let's eat," Adam said.

  After dinner there were stage manager notes. Adam was a cruel master. Leah knew it would only get worse as the hours ticked by toward opening night, but she was feeling as eager, if not as strained, as Adam. Sleep would be in short supply.

  Tomorrow was the final dress rehearsal. The press would be there with their cameras and their notebooks, and there'd be an audience. Leah would miss the empty chairs, and the sensation of being alone, which added to the sorrow of the music. She walked back to the house with Ward at ten, leaving Adam to his manic re-writing of the score.

  "Want a soda?" Ward asked.

  "I'm just taking a shower and going back out."

  "Where?"

  "To see Sophie."

  "The girl from the opera?"

  "Yes." Leah rubbed her forehead. "The girl from the opera."

  Ward nodded. "I'm going to drink Coke and eat chips and watch basketball."

  "It's summer."

  "I've got DVDs."

  Leah raised her eyebrows.

  Ward shrugged and went into the kitchen.

  Leah showered and packed a bag and then spent ten minutes deciding on makeup or au natural. She finally settled for lip gloss, and then spent another twenty minutes trying to find something to wear. She called for Ward.

  "Bless your heart," he said. "Asking a man to dress you."

  "Shut up."

  He opened her underwear drawer, tossed her something satin and bikini-cut that he didn't look at too closely, and then jeans and a polo shirt.

  "I look like a gigolo," she said.

  "Well, if you were a man, you'd look preppy casual."

  She sighed. "Shoes?"

  "Sandals."

  "Sandals?"

  "You're just going to kick them off, aren't you?"

  "Good point."

  He smirked and went back to watching basketball. As she passed the living room, where he was sprawled on the couch, under a homemade afghan, the sight was so appealing that she wanted to stay. The thought of going to Sophia's, having the talk, or not having the talk, or finding that she'd really prefer to sleep alone, or that the show had gone badly and she didn't want to see Leah at all, or that the show had gone so well Leah had no place in it, scared her so much that she opened her mouth and said, "I could stay. If you're--"

  The look Ward gave her was so piercing and disdainful, she fled. She was halfway up the block before her humiliation eased enough to guess that he'd done that just to get her out of the house. She put him out of her mind.

  Sophia was home and there were candles in her hotel room. They were lit and the second bed had been tidied of clothes and papers.

  "You--" Leah started, but Sophia cut her off by saying, "You came," and hugging her tightly.

  Leah dropped the bag and held Sophia close. "Ward suggested I'd be safer if I slept elsewhere."

  "Is he going to put toothpaste in your shampoo?"

  Leah drew back and frowned at Sophia. "Are you?"

  Sophia grinned. She backed away from Leah and went into the room.

  Leah closed the door and then followed Sophia. "How was the show?"

  A shadow crossed Sophia's face. "I don't want to talk about the show."

  "Okay. How'd you do all this?" She gestured to the room.

  "Oh, in the hour between waking up and going to work," Sophia said.

  "You're already a star," Leah said. "Now you just need New York." She put her hand on Sophia's neck, intending to pull her closer for a kiss.

  Sophia smiled and moved away. She sat on the edge of the bed, and asked Leah, "What are we doing?"

  "Do you mean, are we--"

  Leah felt awkward and out of place in the room, in the candlelight and Sophia looking sweet and erotic. Her knees went weak. She sat on the opposite bed, and finished her sentence, trying to be an adult, with Adam's condemnation in the back of her mind. "Are we going to have sex?" She wanted to touch Sophia so much she ached, and ached even more that she couldn't.

  Sophia nodded.

  "I really, really want to," Leah said.

  Sophia looked at the clock, seemingly for something to look at, and then her gaze flickered back to Leah's. "But?"

  "No buts," Leah said. She reached across the space and put her hand on Sophia's knee. The gesture was so bold she wanted to pull her hand back immediately, but she didn't, lingering instead, watching Sophia's face.

  "We close tomorrow," Sophia said.

  "Is that a but?"

  "No," Sophia said. She shook her head. "No, it's just--" She looked away again, and didn't look back. She hadn't reacted to Leah's hand.

  Leah tried to guess the ailment; bad show, bad day, an attraction to someone new, a realization that Sophia was straight and wanted children, wanted Ward, or just didn't want a one-night stand.

  Or maybe she did, and Leah was looking at her wrong.

  Leah gave up guessing, and moved to Sophia's bed, and put her arms around her. Sophia sank back into her embrace. Leah forgot her list of insecurities as she kissed Sophia's hair. Sophia exhaled, a sound of release, and became limp in Leah's arms. Leah kissed Sophia's head, just above her ear, and decided, "Sometimes it's nice just to be," and said it out loud, sliding her hands down Sophia's arms.

  Sophia turned in her arms, putting her hand on Leah's side. Leah shuddered as Sophia's hand dragged across her. Her stomach fluttered. Her skin flushed. Sophia smiled shyly at her and said, "Be in the moment?"

  "Yeah," Leah said. She kissed Sophia, and it was Sophia who continued the pressure against her mouth, as Leah fell back onto the bed. Sophia kept their mouths together, slack and warm. She stroked Leah's waist. Leah raised her knee between Sophia's legs, to trap her, and the resulting sigh against her lips, seeming to come from Sophia's whole body. Need surged through her, demanding more, and she worked her hands down Sophia's back as they kissed. Sophia laughed against her mouth, and pulled back to smile down at Leah.

  "I guess we are," Sophia said.

  Leah lifted her head to kiss Sophia, but Sophia leaned back further, and waited until Leah put her head back down, and leaned down to kiss her forehead. Leah wrinkled her nose. Sophia kissed each eyebrow. Leah worked her hands under the hem of Sophia's shirt.

  Sophia arched when Leah touched her bare stomach. She kissed Leah's mouth, offering her tongue, rubbing herself across Leah's hands. Leah sucked on her tongue, and closed her eyes to the kiss, giving into the sensation of Sophia's skin, the weight of Sophia's breasts against hers, the way Sophia was starting to grind her hips a
gainst Leah's thigh.

  Somewhere close by, a tinny, mechanical version of "Monday, Monday" began to play.

  Sophia groaned.

  Leah pulled her into a hug, to keep her on the bed, but Sophia said, "That's my brother. I told him to call. I just hoped it would be earlier." Leah let go, going completely slack, flinging her arms to the side. Sophia climbed off of her, brushing her abdomen in the process, and got the phone.

  "Don't go anywhere," she mouthed to Leah, and then opened the phone. "Hello?"

  At the sound of the voice on the other end, Sophia's expression became delight. "Hi," she said.

  Leah moved up to the headboard and propped herself against the pillows. Sophia sat down next to her, listening to the voice on the other end of the phone. Leah could hear low, male tones, but they were just making a staccato, buzzing sound. She settled her hand on Sophia's thigh.

  The male voice offered a laugh, loud enough for Leah to hear and then stopped. Sophia started talking. Leah tried to tune her out, to offer a wall of privacy in the inches between their heads, but Sophia's voice interested her. She rested her head on Sophia's shoulder, listening, as Sophia counseled her brother on love. Leah didn't know if the brother was older or younger; she tried to picture him from his voice, and ended up just picturing Donny Osmond.

  Sophia became a different person as she talked to her brother. She was looser, funnier, softer, less demanding with the mess of his life than she was with her own monologues. She seemed completely unselfconscious, and Leah stayed as still as possible not to break the spell.

  "Oh, Jackson," Sophia said, and a tear formed at the corner of her eye.

  Leah kissed her cheek. Sophia smiled at her and then asked, "What? Yes." She squeezed Leah's hand, and Leah was glad to be there, not only to witness but to give what Sophia needed.

  The conversation dragged on and Leah's eyes began to droop. Determined to stay awake, to make love to Sophia, when the arousal had already pooled between her legs, when Sophia's fingers were tracing circles on her thigh, she turned on the television, set it to mute, and watched a talk show. She tried to mimic the exaggerated faces she saw there in the host and the participants. She longed for a mirror. She longed to talk. She was rarely this long in a room with someone without talking. Her jaw worked. She added dialogue to the expressions.

  Sophia covered the mouth of the phone and said, "I think they're talking in Spanish."

  "It's on mute," Leah said.

  Sophia furrowed her brow. She went back to the phone.

  The talk show got boring. Leah channel-surfed before finding the news. She couldn't mimic fires or floods or stocks going up, but the graphics were pretty enough. She stared at them.

  "Leah."

  Sophia shook her. Leah looked over. Rarely had Sophia said her name. It sounded strange and exotic and beautiful coming from her lips.

  "I'm off the phone," Sophia said.

  "How's your brother?"

  "Better. He just needed to talk to someone who understands that he isn't crazy."

  "Takes one to know one?" Leah said.

  Sophia smacked her side. Then she hopped off the bed and went into the bathroom. Leah frowned, turned off the television, and went to retrieve her bag. She'd brought sexy pajamas--the one pair of sexy pajamas she brought on every trip, just in case, and she changed into them quickly and put on Chap Stick and bounded back into bed. Her hair had dried haphazardly, and she considered lunging for the bag again, and her comb, but Sophia emerged, wearing a white T-shirt that said Evita on it, and boxer shorts that looked like they had belonged to a man at one time. Plaid. Leah looked at her legs, as Sophia came over and knelt on the bed and wrapped her arms around Leah.

  "Who were you in Evita?" Leah asked.

  "Oh, no one. I just saw it with my parents and loved it. You know. Theater."

  "Of course."

  "Madonna," Sophia said.

  "Don't cry--"

  Sophia cut her off with a kiss, sealing their mouths together until she seemed sure Leah wouldn't sing. Leah smiled as Sophia pulled back, and said, "We could..." She slid her hands down Sophia's back and urged her closer.

  "We could," Sophia agreed. She pressed her mouth to Leah's. Leah opened her mouth. Sophia's tongue darted inside, small and frustratingly elusive, until Leah put one hand on Sophia's head and urged her to deeper kisses. Sophia knelt next to her, and put one knee between her legs, balancing, and thrust her tongue between Leah's lips.

  Leah went from cold to on fire in a matter of seconds. She tangled her fingers in Sophia's hair, trading breathing for kisses, for the touch of Sophia's lips and tongue that made her face feel flushed and her mouth feel swollen. Sophia's breasts pressed against her chest, and Leah's nipples tightened to the proximity of Sophia's body. Leah slid her hand over Sophia's ass, squeezing, and was rewarded with Sophia's moan against her lips. Sophia was in perpetual motion, pushing against Leah's legs, kissing and retreating and kissing again. Her hands moved over Leah's body freely, but shyly, touching a breast, a hip, her neck.

  Leah wanted to turn her hips into Sophia's, thrust upward and end it all quickly, before she died of desire. She twisted and fell back onto the bed, pulling Sophia over her, their legs still tangled together. Sophia's weight on her pressed all the right places. She reveled, holding Sophia close, seeking more. She raised her leg between Sophia's. Sophia yelped.

  "Too much?" Leah asked.

  Sophia sat up, pressing down on Leah, and settled her hands on Leah's stomach. She smiled.

  Leah tapped the tops of Sophia's thighs. Then she tugged on the hem of Sophia's T-shirt, pushing it up as far as she could reach, revealing Sophia's toned and pale abdomen. Sophia pulled the shirt out of Leah's grasp and pulled it over her head. She wasn't wearing a bra. Leah settled back on the bed and took in the sight, until Sophia arched over her, and kissed her.

  Unable to see Sophia's breasts, she settled for cupping them in her hands, feeling their weight. Sophia rocked against her, biting at her lips, her kisses becoming sloppier, and Leah could tell--could smell and taste and feel--that Sophia wanted her, wanted this. She rolled Sophia to the side so she had more room to maneuver, though she ached with the loss of Sophia's weight and her body urged her to grind into Sophia, to relieve the tension and the need, and Sophia, sprawled on the bed, smiling faintly, half-undressed and rapturous with flushed skin and swollen lips, urged her, too.

  She bent her head to kiss Sophia gently. Sophia lifted her hand, cupped Leah's face, and kissed her back. Leah sucked on Sophia's lower lip. Sophia chuckled, taking hold of Leah's satin top and murmuring, "Your turn."

  "Help me," Leah said, and Sophia grinned and sat up, sliding her hands under Leah's top, caressing her stomach. Leah arched, and said, "More."

  "More?"

  "Mm."

  Sophia scooted down and pushed up the fabric, and kissed bare skin.

  "Sophie," Leah whispered. Sophia grazed her side with her teeth. Leah convulsed. She exhaled with force and hollowed her stomach. Sophia drummed her fingers against her ribs and laughed, then pressed her open mouth to Leah's stomach. Leah would have screamed had she the breath.

  Leah's bag began to chime, "It's Raining Men."

  Leah did scream, and added, "Fuck you!" but the phone persisted in its jangle.

  "Don't answer it," Sophia said.

  Leah sighed. "It's like we're in a movie. But it's Adam's ring, and it's three in the morning and he knows where I am. It could be important."

  Sophia's expression immediately changed to one of concern. She relented and released Leah, who fetched the phone and answered it with her gruffest, "What?"

  "I want to go over your song in Act II again," Adam said, and launched into an explanation of mood and theme.

  Leah listened with half an ear, and went back to the bed, where Sophia had pulled on her T-shirt and pulled back the covers. Leah slid into bed, and offered her lips to Sophia. Sophia kissed her, and Leah murmured against her lips as Adam chattered on.

>   "Adam," she said when the kiss broke and he stopped for breath, "That's what I've been doing."

  "But I want you to stand different. And your face, you have this tic, that needs to stop when you sing this line--"

  Leah groaned.

  Sophia rubbed her back and said, "It is the last night."

  "I don't care about the musical," Leah said, and though Adam squeaked, it felt hollow even as she said it, and Sophia gave her an indulgent smile. "I'm listening, Adam." She stretched out on her side, and Sophia settled next to her, draping an arm around her waist, settling a hand over her heart. Leah wriggled back, tucking into the curve of Sophia's body. Sophia snuggled closer.

  Leah talked to Adam in low tones, her best stage whisper, and in their pauses Sophia's even breathing touched her ears. Sophia was asleep. Well, lucky her, Leah thought. Sleep would elude her for the next three days, through opening night, through the party and the elation and the tension of waiting for the reviews.

  She pitied Adam and his passion, radiating through the phone, and resigned herself to endless late-night calls. She would bow and success or failure would all be on her, her voice bringing forth the lyrics, her face bringing forth the emotion, she didn't have much cause for complaint.

  "This is the best night of my life," she said. And Sophia's embrace, in sleep, tightened around her.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  She left Sophia sound asleep and walked home through the sunny late morning. As she climbed the steps, shouting came from inside the house. Ward's voice. "I can't take this anymore, I need to think."

  "Since when do I pay you to think?" Adam said.

  Leah opened the door.

  Ward saw her and threw up his hands, and asked, "Well, how was your night?"

  Leah cocked her head.

  Adam grabbed his bag and passed Leah and went out the door. He called, "Whenever the divas show up, we'll have our final dress rehearsal. Don't forget the fucking press will be there." He slammed the door.

  "Don't forget the backers," Ward said, with his lazy smile. "They'll be there, too."

  "Can't forget them. I'm going to shower."

  "Gotta wash off your hot night?" Ward asked.