by Robin Talley
It had been—when? The beginning of sophomore year? Two years ago, now. Right after she and Linh had officially become a thing. Abby had spent years daydreaming about the relationship she’d have with an actual, real-life significant other someday, and there were so many things she’d always wanted to do with her someday-fantasy-girlfriend.
Making out in a dark movie theater. Shopping together for prom dresses. Holding hands on the metro. They were simple, silly things, so Abby had kept her daydreams to herself, but she went over and over them in her mind almost every night before she fell asleep anyway.
That afternoon, they’d all gone to the burger place right after school let out. It was a Friday, and by some miracle no one in their friend group had a meeting or a practice. They’d gone for milk shakes and grabbed one of the big tables outside, where they had a front-row view of the people walking up and down Wisconsin. Ben had started giving them a play-by-play on the latest episode of The Walking Dead, complete with his famous imitation zombie shuffle and lots of gross hissing noises. Vanessa kept covering their ears and laughing, and Savannah had gone back to the counter to complain because her banana-pineapple smoothie had too much banana and not enough pineapple.
Abby and Linh had barely heard any of it. They’d snagged a bench a short distance apart from the others, where they could giggle together in semiprivate and share one milk shake with two straws. (That had been one of Abby’s someday-when-I-have-a-girlfriend fantasies, but Linh had gone along with it with such a big grin that Abby wondered if it might’ve been one of her someday-fantasies, too.)
When Ben came over to wave his zombie arms in their faces, Linh laughed, lifted his arm up out of her way and leaned in to kiss Abby right over their milk shake cup.
Abby was so absorbed in the sensation of Linh’s lips on hers, on the perfect shape of how they fit together, on the softness of Linh’s hair under her fingers, that she forgot to notice it was the first time they’d kissed in front of their friends until the whooping and cheering started. Two minutes later, when they’d stopped kissing but were still all flushed and giggly and kind-of-not-really embarrassed, a college student in a paper hat had stepped up to their table and put down a small order of fries on Abby and Linh’s tray. “We’re not supposed to do this,” she’d said, biting her lip to keep from laughing, “but the assistant manager asked me to say you two are really cute together. Oh, and here’s a coupon for twenty percent off.”
There was more whooping and cheering after she went back inside, followed by some grumbling from Savannah about how she’d never gotten twenty percent off a milk shake for being cute in her entire life. Ben and Linh immediately started assuring Savannah they’d give her twenty percent off in their hearts, while Vanessa rolled their eyes, but all Abby could do was blush and hide behind her hand. Having a girlfriend was turning out to be even better than all her someday-fantasies put together.
Now she hid her face behind her cardigan as she sped past the burger place to keep from looking at the empty tables out front. She couldn’t write about that memory. It hurt too much.
Two years ago, things had been easy. No one had expected her to apply to colleges yet. Her parents still consented to be in the same house on the same day, at least some of the time. And Linh... Linh was still Linh.
Abby took out her phone and sent a text asking what Linh was doing without pausing to think it through. A few minutes passed before she got a reply. Homework? Why, what’s up?
I don’t know, Abby wrote. She meant to leave it at that, but something made her type out another message. My dad was home and he kept trying to talk to me and something’s wrong, something big I think...
She couldn’t come up with anything more to say, so she gave up and hit Send.
Linh’s reply came faster this time. Are you okay? Where are you?
I’m fine, Abby typed automatically. Going to the Starbucks in Tenley.
Linh answered even faster than before. Meet you there.
Abby read the text twice to make sure she hadn’t misunderstood. Hmm. Maybe things between her and Linh hadn’t changed as much as she’d thought.
She climbed the hill fast and reached the Starbucks in five minutes flat, only panting a little. She didn’t see Linh, so she found an empty couch in the back and opened her computer, flipping straight to the last chapter of Women of the Twilight Realm.
“No.” Paula took Elaine’s face in her hands. Her touch was gentle but firm. “No. I love you, Elaine. If this is really what you want—if you never want to see me again, if you think it’s too dangerous for us to be together—then I’ll accept that, but I don’t think that’s the case. The Elaine I know, the one I love—that girl isn’t afraid of anything.”
Elaine’s eyes swam with tears. “I love you, too. Still, after everything that’s happened, how can we do this any longer? No one will ever understand.”
“You just said you loved me.” Paula slipped a hand behind Elaine’s neck and pulled her closer, their eyes still locked on one another’s. “I’ve spent so many nights lately lying awake, alone in my cold bed, thinking about how much I need to be with you. If you love me and I love you, then I don’t care whether anybody else understands it. You’re the only one who matters.”
Paula made it sound so simple. It couldn’t be that simple.
Elaine tried the words for herself. “You’re the only one who matters.”
“That’s right, darling.”
“All this time.” Elaine felt something warm in her chest. She couldn’t put a name to it. “I’ve been worrying about what everyone else must think of me.”
“I have, too. Believe me, I have, too.”
“What’s the point of all that worrying, though?” The warmth within her had begun to spread. Elaine felt herself succumbing to the astonishing idea that what she and Paula had was truly worth something. “You know what? To hell with everybody else. To hell with their opinions and their pontificating. You’re everything, Paula. You’re everything to me.”
God, Abby loved that ending so much. It was like a freaking lesbian Disney movie.
“Hey.” Linh was suddenly standing by her couch, looking worried. She slid tentatively into the empty seat next to Abby, her eyes wide, her voice gentle. “Is everything all right? Did something—happen?”
“What? Oh, no.” Abby blinked up at her. Linh was staring at Abby with her lower lip held tightly between her teeth, as though she thought Abby was about to break into pieces. “I mean, there’s something weird going on with my brother, but it’s no big deal. Mostly I just wanted to get out of the house for a while.”
“Oh.” Linh held Abby’s gaze for another moment, then sank backward in her seat. “You’re sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh. Okay.” Linh shoved a lock of hair behind her ear and tugged on her gold stud earring. “You made it sound like an emergency.”
“Oh. Sorry.” Abby dropped her head. She should’ve realized she’d done something wrong. She’d made so many mistakes she probably never deserved to get the perfect feeling from that milk shake afternoon back. “I—I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Linh kept trying to meet her eyes, but Abby looked away. She didn’t want to see pity there again. “If you ever wanted to talk—”
“Yeah, um...” Abby cut her off before Linh could start sounding like Ms. Sloane. “I did—uh. Yeah. I wanted your perspective on something.”
“Sure, what’s up?”
“Well.” Abby tried to think. “I’m looking into other ways to get info about Marian Love.”
“What?” Linh’s eyebrows furrowed. “I thought there was nothing more to find.”
“Well, but there’s got to be something. I bet I could find other stuff she wrote. Letters or something.”
“Didn’t you say Marian Love was only eighteen when she died?” It was amazing how easily Linh could use
the words Marian Love and died so close together without even flinching, when just the sound of it made Abby want to scream until her lungs gave out.
“Sure, but she still could’ve written stuff.” Abby shrugged, trying to match Linh’s easy tone. “I mean, I’m not eighteen yet and I’ve already written a lot of stuff. Remember all those emails we sent over the summer? And before computers, people wrote to each other a lot more. Actual letters, in handwriting even.”
Linh looked doubtful. “I guess...”
“Actually, you know what I should do? I should go ahead and email that other author, Claire Singer, and see if she knows anything. I don’t know why I keep putting that off.” Abby was opening a blank email when a new idea occurred to her. A truly excellent idea. “Actually...hmm. She’s in Philly.”
“Who is?” Linh was typing something into her phone.
“Claire Singer. She lives in Philly. Professor Herbert mentioned that when I was in her office.”
“Okay...” Linh glanced up. “So what?”
“So, we’re going to Philly.” Abby couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought of this before. “The fourteenth, right? That’s this Saturday!”
“Yes, but—” Linh hesitated. How did she not see how obvious this was? “We’re going to visit Penn.”
“Oh, come on, it’s perfect! Your parents already got us the tickets, right? We can go meet Claire Singer and ask her to tell us everything she knows about Marian Love!”
“We’re supposed to be checking out the campus. That’s the only reason my parents are letting me go.”
“Oh, it’ll be fine. We’ll pick up a brochure in the train station and you can tell your parents we got it on a campus tour. I mean, do you even want to go to Penn?”
“Not necessarily, but—” Linh was staring at Abby as though she’d grown three heads. “You haven’t talked about anything except this Marian Love person for weeks, and now you’re saying you want to go all the way to Philadelphia to meet some other author?”
“Come on, we’re going anyway.” If she wheedled enough, Abby was positive she could get Linh to agree. “If you really want to see Penn, there’ll probably be time to do both in one trip.”
“You can’t be serious.” Linh turned toward the counter, where two baristas were arguing over who was responsible for a spill on the floor. “Does this Claire person even want to see you? How old is she? She probably lives in, like, a nursing home.”
“I’ll email her and ask.” Abby turned to the blank email and started typing. “Anyway, if you don’t want to come meet her with me, that’s fine. We can still take the train together and you can go see Penn, but if Claire’s up for it, I’m going to visit her instead.”
“Is that okay with your parents?”
“Oh, as if they care.” Abby tried to shake off Linh’s question and focus on her email. She hadn’t actually told her parents that she and Linh were going to Philly, but she doubted they’d notice anyway. Mom would be in Chicago, and when Dad was in town on a weekend he usually spent all day at the office anyway.
“Right. Um, well... I should probably get back home.” Linh was still watching her, but Abby didn’t meet her eyes again. At this point, she could guess when Linh was pitying her without having to see it spelled out on her face.
“Okay. See you tomorrow.” Abby didn’t turn to watch her go.
She couldn’t believe it had taken her until now to come up with this plan. Claire Singer had known Marian Love. Talking to her would be almost as good as talking to Marian herself. If she knew anything about why Marian Love had written the book the way she did, or if she turned out to have copies of anything else she’d written, it would be the closest Abby would ever come to meeting the real Marian.
If that was the best Abby was going to get—well, then she’d take it.
14
Thursday, August 4, 1955
“So that’ll be two Summer Freezes, a Big Dog, a Double-Decker Delight and a plate of onion rings—is that right?” Janet’s smile never faded, but she barely glanced up from her notepad as she repeated the order back to the blue Oldsmobile in space nineteen.
“That’s right, sweetheart.” The college boy in the driver’s seat didn’t look at Janet, either. His eyes were locked on the pretty blond girl sitting next to him. Locked on the front of her blouse, at least.
“Righty-o. I’ll be back in a jiff with your shakes.”
It was the beginning of August. Congress was in recess, and half the city had gone up north to escape the heat until Labor Day. It was the sort of night where there was absolutely nothing to do in Washington but drive around with the windows down, trying to catch a bit of breeze.
And everyone who drove around, it seemed, drove into the Soda Shoppe sooner or later. Janet’s break had been overdue for half an hour, but she hadn’t been able to take a moment’s rest since her shift began.
She trotted to the counter window and called back the college boy’s order, then filled her tray with burgers for the station wagon with the four screaming kids in the way back. By the time she was done passing the burgers through the wagon’s rolled-down window, car nineteen’s Summer Freezes were bound to be ready so Janet trotted back to the counter, eager to get the shakes passed out so the college boy would have something to do with his hands.
Janet used to look forward to busy nights. Her tips were always good, and there was so much going on it wasn’t possible to think very much about anything except when her orders would be up and whether a new car had pulled into space eleven.
Tonight, though, her thoughts raced even as she trotted from car to car. She missed Marie, who was still too busy to talk, always deflecting Janet with an apologetic smile and a few quiet words when she caught her on her way out of the office.
And she was worried about Grandma. It had been nearly a week since that horrible night in the living room. Janet still couldn’t look at the fireplace without remembering the thick smell of burning paper.
Grandma hadn’t said a word to her about it since. Most days, she barely even looked at her. Janet could only pray she truly believed what she’d said about forgetting, and that they could both go on with their lives pretending it had never happened.
Janet would have to be more careful at home, though. For one thing, she could no longer hide anything under her mattress. She’d carefully arranged the copy of A Deviant Woman that Grandma hadn’t managed to find, along with the carbon copy of her manuscript, her notebook, the pages she’d typed up in the last few weeks, and the letters from Dolores Wood and Bannon Press, in a musty old attic trunk, burying it all deep under a pile of winter underwear.
She was still writing, though. Or trying to. But the words weren’t coming as easily as they had before.
She’d already begun the ending of Alone No Longer. Paula, mistakenly believing that Elaine didn’t love her, had sent her a letter ending their relationship. Next Janet needed to write the scene where Elaine accepted Wayne’s proposal, and the scene that came after it, where Wayne discovered the truth and came after Paula with his brother’s hunting rifle. Elaine would intervene at the last moment, throwing herself between them, but Paula would tell Wayne he was wrong, and that Elaine had never loved her. Then Paula would leap to her death off the twelfth-story fire escape, sacrificing herself for the sake of Elaine’s future.
So far, Janet hadn’t been able to bring herself to write those last few scenes. Her characters had already gone through so much. There were so many changes happening, in the world around them and within Paula and Elaine themselves. This last set of changes was more than Janet could bear.
Her control over her own characters seemed to be slipping. She’d tried and tried again, but she simply couldn’t think of a way to make Elaine realize that marriage was her best option. Even though marriage was the only proper option for any normal girl. And whenever Janet tried to write that down, it
made her want to cry.
The biggest problem, though, was that despite Bannon Press’s mandate that the characters face “appropriate resolutions,” the idea of killing Paula made Janet’s stomach twist into knots. Paula was hers. She was Janet’s creation. Even though it was silly—Paula was only fictional after all—the idea of killing her felt like killing a piece of herself.
Maybe that was why she couldn’t stop thinking about Senator Hunt and his son. Janet knew she’d have to take whatever steps necessary to make sure her own parents never discovered her secret. The senator’s story had already inspired her to add a new scene to Alone No Longer’s ending, about Elaine’s father dying in mysterious circumstances.
Between all the lying, the worrying and the struggles with her writing, there were simply too many things happening at once. Janet’s life felt constantly on the brink of tipping over.
“Hey, honey!” A car horn shrieked behind her. Janet whipped around to see the college boy from space nineteen leaning out the Oldsmobile window. She’d been standing in the middle of the parking lot, halfway to the milk shake counter, all this time.
She ran, neglecting the rules altogether, and grabbed the Summer Freezes, carrying them swiftly across the lot. The boy frowned when she set the glasses down on the car-side stand. “Not really a jiff, then, was it?”
Janet didn’t let her smile waver as she recited her line. “Hope you enjoy your Summer Freeze! The way to beat the August heat is with a nice orange breeze.”
When she trotted back to the kitchen counter, she was dismayed to find Mr. Pritchard standing behind it.
“I saw you running, Janet.” He shook his head. “You know the rules. Keep it to a trot.”
“Yes, sir.”
“The Soda Shoppe is where our customers come to relax, to get away from the fast pace of modern life. They don’t want to see a carhop girl running all over the place.”