“I have a feeling it didn’t go very well. Am I right?”
“It went very poorly. I’m sure I had a bit of an attitude, but all things considered, I was very mild. Let’s just say they questioned my authority to speak to them. One of them used some pretty profane language and that does not ever fly at Luxor. I marched back into the kitchen and found the person in charge. I had to write the whole thing up and talk to Human Resources and waste hours of my time, but they were both fired—as they should have been.”
“Was getting them fired the only option?” Kaatje asked quietly.
Oh, Lord. It was nearly impossible to explain the Luxor dynamic to outsiders. You had to live it to truly get it. “In my view, yes. I didn’t ask for them to be fired, but that’s what their boss chose to do, and I thought it was the right move.”
“Maybe they were having a bad day. You might have come across stronger than you think you did.”
“That’s possible. But you don’t make fun of team members. That’s nonnegotiable. For anyone at any level of the company. And even if you’re having a bad day, you don’t curse at team members in a public area. I’m sure their jobs are difficult, but we need people who have some resilience. You don’t screw with the brand.”
“Okay. It’s your brand. I’ve gotta get going now. This boat won’t sail itself. If you get Skype set up, call me tonight when you get home. It doesn’t matter how late.”
“Okay, I will. Happy sailing. And Kaatje?”
“Yeah?”
It was hard to step back and try to connect with her feelings, but she tried to inject a little of the tenderness she felt about Kaatje when she’d let herself think about her that morning. “Don’t train any new first mates. That’s my job.”
*
Laurie was able to find a way to call by eleven, Kaatje’s usual bedtime. She had her phone set up properly and was already at home, even though it was only seven o’clock, an impossibly early hour for being only a few months from opening. They talked for a long time and the emotional connection between them was much better than it had been in the morning. After an hour they were both exhausted and agreed to go to bed.
Laurie remembered one last thing. “Hey, I stopped and got some sashimi on the way home. No fat, no simple carbohydrates, no sugar. And I left work by six thirty.”
“After getting in at five.”
“It was three, but who’s counting?” She giggled tiredly. “Sleep well. I’ll call you soon.” She hung up and stared at her phone. She knew she’d call the next day. Getting home on time to talk to Kaatje had motivated her to fly around the office like a dervish. Now she just had to perform the same feat the next day, and the day after that…
Chapter Ten
TALKING EVERY DAY was a dream that Laurie had fully intended to realize, but her reality was far removed from the dream. She had to find a different way to connect with Kaatje or risk losing her. She’d tried to stop briefly to call her during the day, but the few such conversations they’d managed hadn’t gone well at all. They were stilted, and Laurie found herself constantly distracted. She also tried, but she simply could not manage, to get home by seven. The solution came to her during a meeting she should have been paying more attention to. That night, right before tumbling into bed, she wrote a long e-mail to Kaatje. It wasn’t much, but it helped her vent some of the tension that built up throughout the day, and it made her see how many of the things that had seemed important were pretty trivial.
Kaatje responded by calling and leaving a message when she woke up. It was short, just a minute or two, but it was enough to keep her in Laurie’s heart, right where she’d discovered she needed her. Amazing. It was simply amazing.
*
About a week after she returned home, Laurie caught Kaatje on the boat on Saturday night. She was calm, relaxed and loquacious, having spent the day with a taciturn group of businessmen whom even rum hadn’t made chatty.
“You know what I was thinking about today?” Laurie asked.
“Numbers. You were thinking about how to make numbers dance before your very eyes.”
Laughing, Laurie said, “That’s not far from right. But I was also thinking about you. Actually, I was wondering if you’re getting as much out of this…this getting to know each other…as I am.” That was a sentence that might go down in the ineloquent hall of fame. Talking about touchy subjects was never going to come easily.
“Let’s see,” Kaatje said slowly. “I’m getting to know someone who I’m remarkably attracted to. What are you getting?”
“Well, that’s what I’m getting too, but if you did a focus group on which of us is the better catch, there’s no contest.”
“Braggart.”
“No! You’re the one!” That was dumb. Kaatje was clearly teasing. Learning to lighten up was going to be a full time job. But where to find another hour, much less forty a week?
“Laurie, I’m very, very interested in you. From my perspective, your only fault is that you work too hard. When you relax you’re playful and fun, not to mention really smart and clever and hardworking. It might not seem like it, but I admire people with determination, and you’ve got more than anyone I’ve ever met.”
“Why wouldn’t it seem like that’s something you’d admire?”
“Because I’m lackadaisical.”
“That’s not the right word. You follow your loves. Just because you don’t put in eighty-hour weeks doesn’t mean you don’t care.”
“Yeah, I know, but I seem like a sloth to most people.”
She seemed like a sloth to her father. Everyone else was just jealous. “Not to me. It’s hard to be a gracious host to a bunch of strangers tromping all over your home. We train people for years in how to manage visitors, but you just picked it up on your own. That’s a skill.”
“Maybe. More likely that’s just my personality. But we’re talking about me again. I wasn’t finished with telling you what I get from our…whatever you called it.”
“I called it something dumb. I can’t even remember what.”
“Whatever it is, I get the hope that I’ve met someone I can learn to care for. Someone I can trust. Someone who makes my knees quiver when she looks at me. I don’t think I’ve ever had all of those things at once, and I’m going to keep learning about you until all of your horrible faults start showing up.”
Laurie found it hard to wipe the smile off her face. “Keep looking. I know they’re in there somewhere.”
*
About a month after returning to LA, Laurie drove over Laurel Canyon to Sunset Boulevard. There was no way to justify taking a whole day off to get ready for her coworkers’ wedding, but that didn’t stop her from trying. Luxor wanted their executives to look good as well as be good. Getting her hair trimmed was just part of polishing the brand. And having good-looking nails was required. People looked at your hands when you signed contracts, didn’t they? A good manicure was good business. Being able to accomplish multiple tasks with a minimum of effort showed resourcefulness. Buying a new dress after finishing at the salon was just good business sense.
The wedding was in Burbank, a quick drive from her home, and she was planning on sitting with some of her oldest friends from Luxor. At different points in her career, Laurie had worked with both grooms, Steve and Ray. But Steve had moved from Theme Parks to Corporate and she didn’t see him nearly as much as before. They were the kinds of guys she’d loved to have spent more time with, but all she managed for the last couple of years was a quick lunch with one or the other when they ran into each other in the cafeteria.
The ceremony was being held at a country club, and the grooms set it up so they would say their vows on a small, round stage in the middle of a very large room. That gave everyone a good view, and allowed the guests to sit at their tables and have a drink during the service. That was just what Laurie would have expected of them. They both loved to have fun, and neither was a stickler for formality.
As she sat at the tabl
e, looking around at her friends, she realized that all, except one, were gay or lesbian. That struck her, and she sat up straighter and looked around at the other tables. She knew people at nearly every one, and saw that most of them were segregated by sexual orientation. Fernando and the other higher ranking people all sat together. There were two lesbians in his group, but both of those women outranked him. Title must have trumped orientation. Otherwise, the straights sat with the straights and the gays with the gays. These were not prejudiced people. They probably just felt more comfortable with people like themselves. An entire table of their black colleagues confirmed this in her mind…until she saw Eric, a black gay man sitting with other gay men, all white. It seemed that people aligned themselves with the group they most identified with. The senior VPs probably felt more like executives than gay or straight people.
She studied her table again. Nine other people—one woman who, to Laurie’s knowledge, had never had a relationship with man or woman, three lesbian couples and one gay couple. What did that say about her? She could have made plans with any number of other people. Fernando had explicitly asked her to sit at his table. But she hadn’t wanted to. She felt more comfortable socializing with this group than any other.
The ceremony started with the band playing “A Taste of Honey,” Teddy Bear’s theme song, but after a few bars it segued into “Here Comes the Bride.” Everyone laughed, since that was just what one would have expected from Ray and Steve. But when each man entered the room from opposite sides, accompanied by parents and siblings, the room grew quiet. Astonishingly, Laurie felt tears spring to her eyes. She hadn’t even brought a pack of tissues, never considering that the ceremony would make her tear up. A friend seated next to her discreetly handed her a tissue, whispering, “Knock it off or I’ll lose it too.”
That broke the tension and Laurie smothered a laugh. “I’ll behave.”
But when the grooms met on the dais, she had to bite both of her lips and then escalate to fingernails digging into her palm to keep from bawling. Ray and Steve looked incredibly happy. She didn’t think she’d ever seen two people who looked more excited about committing their lives to one another. Then Kaatje’s image flashed in her mind and thoughts of the two of them having a similar ceremony washed over her before a fist lodged in her stomach. Whether it was Kaatje or not, she could no longer ignore the fact that she belonged on that dais with a woman. Only a woman.
*
The next morning Laurie woke with a hangover. The two glasses of wine, plus a little champagne, were well within her capacity. But spending the entire evening thinking about her sexual orientation? That was definitely out of the ordinary, and her body and mind had rebelled in this foreign territory.
She got up and went to make coffee, something she rarely did since it was much easier to stop at Starbucks on her way to work. Rummaging through her cabinets, she found an unopened can of coffee, then saw that it was dated two years ago. Colin probably bought it.
She started to cry. Colin was a great guy. A guy any thoroughly straight woman would have loved to have had. But she’d treated him like he was another project to manage. Given him the minimum amount of time to achieve the maximum output. It shamed her to think how little she’d given. She was tempted to call him, but wasn’t at all ready to discuss her feelings, and rather doubted that Colin would be interested, at this late date, to hear them.
Instead of making coffee, she went to her computer and started to make a list. Evidence for lesbian versus evidence for straight. Hours passed. By the time her headache was so bad she couldn’t ignore it any more, she took a shower, got dressed, got in her car and drove around, foraging for food and drink. Her headset was in her ear, as it almost always was, and she pressed a button on her phone. Moments later her mother answered.
“Hi, Mom. Guess what?”
*
It was nine o’clock in the evening in St. Maarten when Laurie called Kaatje. “Hi,” she said, not sure of where to start. “I took the day off today.”
“Really? I’m surprised, but happy. Did you do something fun or did you party too much last night?”
“Not really. I had a tougher time than I do at work, but I figured something out.”
“What?”
“I’m gay.”
There was a significant pause. “You’re gay…and you figured that out since I talked to you yesterday morning?” The suspicion in Kaatje’s voice was more than slightly evident.
“Well, I started thinking about it last night at the wedding.”
“Oh, well, that’s entirely different. A day and a half is ample time for that.”
“Don’t tease me,” Laurie said, slightly stung. “That’s more time than I’ve put into thinking about my life in years.”
“Laurie.” Kaatje’s voice took on that warm, soothing tone that made Laurie’s heart melt. No one had ever said her name with such care. “I’m very glad you’re thinking about this, but you can’t make up your mind about such a big topic in a few hours.”
“Yes, I can. I’m a doer, not a thinker. I’ve obviously had this percolating in the back of my head for a long while, and I sat down today and laid out the facts.”
The spurt of sound made it obvious Kaatje was suppressing a laugh, but, to her credit, she did not guffaw. “Tell me the facts.”
Laurie rustled the sheets of paper she’d printed out. “It’s a long list. But on the straight side there’s only one item. ‘Usually enjoyed sex with men.’ That seems a little lean, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah, unless the gay side said, ‘Usually enjoyed sex with Kaatje.’”
“I’m sending you the document right now. I’ll call you back in a half hour.” She hit Send and went into the kitchen to finish her salad.
A half hour later, Kaatje answered on the first ring and started to speak without even bothering with a greeting. “I don’t mean to be unkind, but how did you ignore these clues?”
“I didn’t let myself or didn’t want to think about them. I’ve been too busy to have a personal life.” That sounded like whining, but that’s how she felt. Like a kid who’d been called on the carpet for neglecting her homework.
“I know, but all of the crushes you had on other little girls. That didn’t even make you think you might be gay?”
“Not really. When boys started trying to steal kisses, I figured that’s what the next step was. I honestly didn’t stop to think if that was what I wanted.”
“Do you think you’ve always been like this?”
“Gay? Or something else?”
“Uhm…uninterested in thinking about your needs.”
“That’s a polite way to put it. Yeah, I suppose I have. I broke a bone in my foot when I was in a gymnastics meet. I didn’t say a word and kept going until my coach caught me trying to borrow a shoe from an older girl with bigger feet. My own shoe would have burst if I could have even gotten my swollen foot into it.”
Kaatje laughed softly, but her laugh didn’t have its usual gaiety. “I’m surprised I didn’t see you in the Olympics.”
“Oh, you would have. But my parents made me quit when I was fourteen. I’ve never been that mad at two people. I barely spoke to my mom for months.”
“Why’d they made you quit?”
“Because I developed an eating disorder and hadn’t gotten my period yet, even though the doctor said I should have.”
“Laurie, Laurie, Laurie.”
“They were right, of course. I’d probably have osteoporosis by now if I’d stuck with it. I had to limit myself to about six hundred calories a day to keep from growing.”
Kaatje’s tone was incredulous. “You intentionally tried to keep yourself from growing?”
“I had to. If you start to develop, you screw up your center of gravity. Breasts and hips don’t work in gymnastics.” Of course it sounded stupid to an outsider, but inside gymnastics you realized that was one of the sacrifices you had to make. It was all about the team, and the team always won over the
individual.
“Okay. Let’s get off this dismal topic and talk about today. How do you feel?”
“Fine. Good, actually. I called my mom and told her and she’s going to tell my dad and my sister.”
“You called your mom already?”
“Sure. I’m not going to change my mind. I might as well get the process started.”
“This isn’t the same as building a roller coaster. It takes time, and you’ll have second thoughts. Everyone does.”
“No way,” she said, chuckling. “I’ve thought about it, made my analysis and disseminated the information to the interested parties.” She waited a second, met by stone cold silence. “I was kidding, Kaatje…partially.”
“It’s the partial part that has me worried. I don’t want this to come back and slap you in the face. Why don’t you take it slow?”
“No, that’s not me. I’m a lesbian. I’ve always been one, I just didn’t stop to smell the…” She chuckled evilly. “That probably isn’t the best analogy. But I am one, and that’s a major item I can cross off my to do list for my personal life.”
“This isn’t how I’d handle this, but I think I know you well enough to know I can’t change your mind.”
“Not me. I’m still considering going back into competitive gymnastics. My mom can’t keep a close watch over me out here in LA.”
“I wish I was sure you were kidding.”
“I’m obviously kidding. Do you know how many hours a day you have to work to be competitive in gymnastics? Teddy Bear would never allow it.” She hung up with the sound of Kaatje’s lovely laugh caressing her ear.
Chapter Eleven
A WEEK LATER, Kaatje was back in Holland for her friend’s wedding when Laurie called late on a Saturday afternoon. “Hi,” she said, unable to keep the excitement from her voice. “How would you like to meet me in Madrid?”
“Madrid?” There was a slight pause. “You know Madrid’s not in The Netherlands, right?”
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