by Robin Talley
“Of course,” Janet echoed. She rubbed her arms.
If the post office so much as finds an obscene letter in the mail...
What about 108 pages of fiction, laden with obscenity from start to finish?
Her manuscript should have arrived in New York ages ago, but Janet still hadn’t heard from Mr. Levy. What if her package had never reached Bannon Press?
What if it had been intercepted? What if it was being read, right now, by the FBI?
What if there was a man in a trench coat following them, listening to every word they said?
Janet turned in a slow, careful circle, surveying the yard and the alley from every angle. She saw no one.
But this was absurd. The government couldn’t be investigating her. She was an eighteen-year-old schoolgirl.
And Marie was a State Department typist. Whose boss had just been fired for immorality.
If the FBI read what Janet had put in the mail—if they realized what she and Marie had been doing...
Marie would be fired. She’d never be able to get another job, and her parents would cast her out. It would be the same for Janet, too.
Everyone would know. Just as they’d all known about Mr. Harris and Mr. Thomas.
“The worst part’s the rumor I heard as I was leaving.” Marie took a deep breath. “They’re stepping up the questioning, and a typist is being investigated.”
Janet heard her own voice grow low and thin. “Did they say who it was?”
“No, but I’m terrified that it’s me. You still haven’t told anyone, have you?”
“I...” Janet swallowed. She couldn’t keep this secret. “I’m so sorry, Marie.”
Silence stretched between them for a moment. Then Marie leaped to her feet and let out a short, strangled sound, as though she’d run out of air. “What?”
“It isn’t what you think.” Janet tried desperately to explain. “It was before I knew about all this, and—”
“Who did you tell? The FBI?” Marie began to pace in sharp circles around the narrow yard.
“I didn’t tell the FBI!” Janet fought to get the words out. “I didn’t tell anyone about you, I swear! I only—I put something in the mail, that’s all.”
Marie didn’t speak for a long, dark moment. Janet had never hated silence more.
“What was it?” she finally whispered.
“My manuscript.” Janet bent forward and picked at a loose thread on her uniform pants. Marie started pacing faster, her circles widening past the storage shed and toward the rickety wooden steps by the back porch. “The first half of the book I’m writing. I mailed it to New York, to the publisher who asked for it. It only has my name on it, not yours, but—well, I haven’t heard back from the editor yet and it’s been weeks, so I don’t—”
“Weeks?”
“I’m so sorry.” Janet wished she could race to the FBI office that very night and snatch the pages back from whatever pile they’d wound up sitting on. “I had no idea it would put you in danger!”
“Well, at least now I know for sure which typist they’re investigating.” Marie let out a bark of a laugh. “It’s me.”
“You can’t be certain.”
“Come to think of it, it’s too great a risk for us to be discussing this. Even here.” Marie’s words grew cold. “We shouldn’t see each other again.”
“What?” Janet shook her head, dazed. “You mean—at all?”
“It’s not what I want, either, but—”
“What about after your clearance comes in?” Janet’s voice broke. “It shouldn’t be long, should it? A few more days? Then we can go back to the way things were.”
Marie didn’t answer.
Janet’s heart felt fragile. As though it were about to shatter all over again.
“They’ll have found your book by now.” Marie sighed. “They’ll have traced the line back from you to me. It wouldn’t have been difficult if they checked the school records. The photos of us together in the yearbook, and that time our award at the science fair was mentioned in the Evening Star...” She pressed both hands into her forehead and exhaled heavily. “I’ll be called in any day.”
“No. No, they wouldn’t—”
“They will. They’re doing a review of our division in any case, to see if any of us knew about Mr. Harris and Mr. Thomas and kept it quiet. At least now I’ll know what to expect.”
“But—you didn’t know anything about Mr. Harris and Mr. Thomas.” Janet fought to keep her voice low. “You were as surprised as anyone.”
“That doesn’t matter.” Marie resumed her pacing. “Don’t you see? Everybody’s desperate to make Congress think they’re rooting out security risks, and nobody cares who it hurts. They want us all to snitch on each other. If one person suspects even a hint of—they call it unconventionality—in anyone else, the investigators will want to hear about it. Everyone who holds a grudge will get their chance to take revenge.”
“Oh.” Janet found she couldn’t argue any further. If the FBI and Congress and the security staff at the State Department were all so ready to ferret out homosexuals that they’d be willing to take the word of a single spiteful coworker, then an actual homosexual barely stood a chance at making it through any inquiry. “I see.”
“You understand, then. It’s too risky for us to keep seeing each other.”
“But we can’t be sure of anything yet.” Janet rose from the swing and closed the short distance between her and Marie, grabbing her arm as she reached the porch steps. “I’m so sorry. I made a terrible mistake, but there’s got to be something we can do to keep you out of danger. We can’t let them fire you just for being—different!”
“I don’t want to be different, Janet.”
It took a moment for the words to sink in.
Janet stepped backward, releasing her arm. “You—what?”
Marie looked up at her. Their eyes locked in the dim light, and Janet understood.
“I can’t do this anymore.” Marie’s words were low but clear in the still, humid night air. “I can’t live this way. It’s awful. I mean, it’s wonderful, too, but—”
“You said you loved me.” Janet swallowed and stepped forward, until their faces were only inches apart. Janet studied every inch of Marie, memorizing her, in case she never got another chance.
“I do love you.” Marie bit her lip. “That only makes it harder.”
“Then don’t do this.”
“I can’t take any risks that might cause my family to find out.” Marie looked away. “You must understand, this would kill them.”
There was a time when Janet might have shaken her head at such talk. Now, though, she didn’t argue.
She stared at Marie’s bare face. The tears in the corners of her eyes. The soft tremble of her lower lip.
It would be so easy for them to kiss here in the dark, empty yard. Suddenly, foolishly, Janet was frantic for it.
“My mother thinks Harold will offer me his pin on our next date.” Marie’s voice was flat. Empty of any feeling. “She’s anxious for me to tell him yes. She says it will help with Dad’s chances at this promotion. If I accept, she says it’ll mean we’re—we’ll be engaged to be engaged.”
It felt as though Marie had slapped her.
She kept talking after that, offering further explanations about pins and plans and Harold, but Janet shut her eyes. She wished she could shut her ears, too.
I’ve got to remember how this feels, Janet told herself. Every moment. Every memory. I can use this in my writing.
She’d thought that idea might lessen the pain. It didn’t.
“Please don’t do this.” Janet wanted to cry, but her eyes felt dry and empty. Like the rest of her. “I’m so sorry. I made a terrible mistake, putting those pages in the mail. Perhaps I could talk to someone at your office, te
ll them you and I are innocent—”
“That would only make it worse.”
“But there’s got to be some way I can fix this!”
“There’s nothing you can do.” Marie cast her eyes down, staring at a tiny patch of grass illuminated by the streetlight behind them. “You’ve done enough already.”
It was another slap. Sharper than the first. And when Marie turned and walked slowly out the gate, disappearing into the dark alley, Janet didn’t try to stop her.
Marie was right. Janet had ruined everything.
She’d put those chapters in the mail, and they had vanished into a dark, threatening void. Thanks to her, the whole world could soon find out about Janet and Marie.
All because of a stupid book she’d spotted in a bus station. A book that was now no more than ash. Janet wished she’d walked away the moment she first spotted that garish red cover on the wire rack.
She exhaled, long and slow, as she climbed the stairs to the darkened porch. She’d had no business reading those books. No one could live this way, not without sacrificing everything that mattered. The books’ own contents made that clear enough.
Janet unlatched the screen door and felt around for the light switch. She wondered if she ought to go around the front of the house—would her parents be alarmed to hear her coming in from the back?—but found she didn’t care.
It didn’t turn out to matter in any case. When she turned on the porch light and saw Grandma sitting there in the dark, her cold eyes locked on Janet, she realized just how right Marie had been to tell her to stay away.
All Janet had ever done was make things much, much worse.
15
Saturday, October 14, 2017
The feeling was unlike any I had ever known. I should have been ashamed to be touched this way by another woman, yet the only sensation I knew was pure pleasure. Sam’s touch was the touch of the divine.
“Do you remember what Mr. Radclyffe said about how to do this permutation?” Linh squinted at her laptop screen. Their train kept hitting bumps, making their computers bounce on the tiny tray tables. “Was there something about a factorial function?”
“No clue.” Abby scrolled to the next page to see how much longer the sex scene was going to last. She was sitting in the window seat, trying to read A Love So Strange.
Claire Singer’s book had its moments, but it was no Women of the Twilight Realm. Abby had already skipped ahead to the ending, so she knew one of the women decided to marry a dude and the other one got flattened by a taxi. It was as if this book had invented the gay-tragedy trope all by itself.
“What do you mean, no clue? He just talked about it yesterday.” Linh glanced over and pursed her lips when she saw Abby’s screen. “Reading again?”
“I’m only being polite. Claire Singer is ninety-something years old and I’m about to troop into her retirement home and ask her about a bunch of painful memories. The least I can do is read her book before I go in there.”
“Well, are you planning to also do your homework at some point? For your classes that aren’t creative writing?”
Abby sighed. She was glad she hadn’t told Linh about Ms. Taylor’s phone call. “It’s not a big deal. I’m not majoring in math or anything.”
“But what about getting into college in the first place?”
“Ugh, you sound like my parents.” She didn’t, really—Abby couldn’t remember the last time they’d brought up college—but maybe that line would get Linh off her back.
“I guess I just don’t get why you’re going to see this lady today.” Linh clicked out of the stats assignment and opened the Common Application. Abby looked away. “I bet she wouldn’t mind if you canceled. Then you could come with me to check out Penn like we planned.”
“What? Of course I’m not going to cancel! Besides, I don’t want to go to Penn.”
“It isn’t about whether you want to go there, specifically.” Linh’s tone was so patient it bordered on patronizing. “It’s October of your senior year, and it’s way past time to start visiting schools. For real, you’ve got to start thinking seriously about college, Abby.”
God, Linh really was like Paula. Not always in a good way, either.
“How does visiting a school I don’t want to go to mean I’m thinking seriously about college?” Abby tried not to let her annoyance creep into her voice. “It sounds like the opposite to me.”
“I mean, Penn’s not at the top of my list either or anything, but...” Linh shrugged as the Amtrak conductor said something over the speakers above them. His words were impossible to decipher, but from the screeching train wheels, Abby deduced that they were pulling into the station at Philly. Linh closed her laptop and bent to grab the bag at her feet as people started getting up around them, reaching into the overhead racks for their suitcases. “Going to check out a college makes a lot more sense than going to some random retirement home.”
“It isn’t random. Claire Singer is the one living person who actually knew Marian Love!”
“Look.” Linh had to raise her voice for Abby to hear her over the train’s lurching. “I’m only saying...don’t take this the wrong way, but it’s as if this whole saga of some dead author has become your entire life, even though there’s other stuff that’s way more important that you aren’t paying enough attention to. Like school and college and—” Linh looked down. “And, you know. Your friends.”
Abby had cringed so hard at “some dead author” that she barely heard the rest of what Linh said. She slumped down in her seat, folding her arms across her chest. “A real friend wouldn’t put this much pressure on me.”
Linh’s eyes cut away as the train rolled to a stop. “I’m only trying to help.”
“Okay, well, if you want to help, then help. Come with me to meet Claire. If she has any material I can look at, I could use another pair of hands to go through everything. Or you could help me parse through what she says for clues, or—”
“Clues?” A crease grew between Linh’s eyebrows. Behind them, people were hurrying down the aisle to line up by the doors. “There’s no mystery to solve. We already know what happened. Marian Love died.”
“God, could you please not say—” Abby cut herself off.
“Not say what?”
“That she—you know.”
“What, that she died?” Linh shook her head and looked around in alarm, as though finally noticing the train had stopped. “Crap, we have to go.”
“I’m serious.” Abby was starting to feel shaky. “For real, please don’t say it again.”
“What?” Linh stood up, her head swiveling toward the exits. The doors to the car were open, and the aisles were starting to empty. The only other people still in their seats were the passengers staying on until the next stop. “Come on, Abby, you’ve got to face reality. Marian Love is dead, and obsessing about her won’t change that.”
“Oh, okay.” Abby jerked her backpack out from under the seat in front of her. “Sure, I’m obsessed. At least I’m not going to visit a college I don’t even want to apply to just so I can look special.”
Linh’s eyes widened. “What?”
“I’m only saying.” Abby turned away. Linh’s voice kept echoing in her mind, saying “died” and “dead” and “Marian Love” over and over, taunting her. “All you think about anymore is this college shit.”
“It isn’t shit. It’s my future, and yours, too. And I’m not doing this just to look special!”
“Right, of course.” New passengers were boarding the train heading north from Philly, but Abby barely noticed. Her thoughts were moving too fast to keep track of what was happening around her, or the words spewing from her mouth. “The future is all that’s worth caring about, right?”
“Well...kind of! That’s how this whole thing works.” Linh swept a hand around, as though looking for a ges
ture that encompassed the entire universe. “I know the past is a lot easier to think about, but you can’t fixate on all this random stuff just because you don’t want to deal with your actual life. I know you’ve somehow got it in your head that you don’t have to worry about college or anything else, because you think time will stop or something until your parents get back together, but real life isn’t a cheesy romantic comedy! You have to move on, Abby!”
The announcer came on again. With the engines stopped, they could hear him clearly. “Philadelphia 30th Street Station. Train 251 to New York Penn Station, all aboard!”
Linh stood up, shrugging her backpack onto her shoulders.
Abby didn’t move. She wasn’t sure she could move.
“Okay.” Linh looked down, scrubbing a hand over her face. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that, but we have to go. The train’s leaving.”
Abby still didn’t answer. She swallowed, trying to go over Linh’s words in her head.
“I didn’t mean to act like it isn’t a big deal, what you’re going through with your family.” Linh glanced behind them. The new passengers were settling into their seats. “We seriously have to go, Abby.”
“Train ready to embark!” the conductor shouted from the next car.
“Come on.” Linh stepped out into the aisle, earning a glare from a businessman trying to maneuver a suitcase into the overhead. “We’ll talk in the station.”
Abby shook her head. Nothing in the world could stop her from seeing Claire Singer, but she wasn’t going anywhere with Linh. “You first.”
“Fine.” Linh sighed. “If we get separated, I’ll meet you back at the station at five. Look, I’m sorry again, okay?”
Abby didn’t answer. She waited until Linh turned to go, moving fast with a curtain of dark hair hiding her face. Only then did Abby grab her backpack and shuffle into the aisle, heading for the opposite exit. The train doors slid closed seconds after she’d jumped onto the platform.
She kept her head down and moved slowly through the station, trying to lose Linh in the crowd. It worked. A few minutes later Abby was climbing into a blue-and-white taxi, alone, and giving the driver Claire Singer’s address.