The Second Wave

by Jean Copeland

  Kathy grew antsy. “Look, I’m not gonna beat around the bush anymore. I have a pretty good idea why you and Leslie don’t come crocheting anymore.”

  “What are you insinuating?” Alice said, riled up. “I’m coming back. I’ve just needed some time to get settled up here.”

  Kathy placed a hand on Alice’s. “Alice, you don’t have to defend yourself against anything. I just wanted to introduce you to this place since you’re living so near to it now. Whether you come back on your own is your business.”

  Alice took a long sip of her beer and avoided Kathy’s eyes. Why was she embarrassed to confide in Kathy? She’d moved away to live the life she felt would bring her happiness, and now she was shying away from the first chance she had to explore it.

  “I think I just might drop by again,” she said, finally looking at Kathy. “If I can work up the nerve.”

  Kathy smiled. “I don’t mind taking a ride to come here with you sometime. There’s also a place in New Haven, but I’m more comfortable up here.”

  “Thanks. I’m sorry I got so testy with you the last time you tried to talk to me about it.”

  “It’s okay. I understand how that goes. So what about Leslie?”

  “What about her?”

  “I was just wondering if she was in a situation similar to yours.”

  “No, no,” Alice said. “She’s happily married. There was nothing between us, if that’s what you’re suggesting.” No matter how compassionate Kathy was being, Alice would protect Leslie to the end.

  “I gotcha.” Kathy lit up a cigarette and perused the burgeoning crowd. “But I’m right about you having a thing for her.”

  Alice pursed her lips, a reluctant confession, as her knee bobbed on the barstool.

  “I remember what that was like. I don’t think any lesbian’s ever dodged the dreaded curse of the straight girl. Mine was in college.”

  “I’m thirty-three years old, a little old for schoolgirl crushes.”

  “Age has no bearing on it. It’s all relative to when you realize you’re a lesbian. A woman can be sixty and have her first schoolgirl crush if that’s when she finally has a sexual epiphany.”

  Alice observed a group of women in softball uniforms doing shots and cheering each other on. “I don’t get it. How did I just wake up one day and realize I was in love with Leslie?”

  Kathy exhaled a stream of smoke. “It’s not like we’re given the option of liking girls when we’re kids. A lot of us grew up doing what’s expected of us until that one woman came along and said, ‘Tag! You’re it.’”

  “Is that why you knew in college?”

  “No. I knew long before that, but I went to Sarah Lawrence. There was no way I was getting out of there without an encounter.”

  “Guess I should’ve gone to college.”

  “So what’s next for you?”

  “I have no idea,” Alice said, scanning the crowded pub. “I just can’t see myself as part of all this. I’d rather sit home and read or watch television.”

  “You need time to get over Leslie.”

  “How do you get over someone who made you feel like no one else ever has?”

  “I don’t mean to sound insensitive, but you can start by finding someone you can actually have. A married woman with kids is kind of like the Mount Everest of love interests for someone who’s barely climbed a hill.”

  “I agree, but it’s not like I can go pick one off the lesbian tree. Anyway, Lynda Carter’s taken right now.”

  “Hmm, Lynda Carter,” Kathy said with a lascivious gleam. “That’s one hell of a fox. Now I understand why you’d want to stay home and watch TV.”

  Alice raised her beer mug in a toast and then took a sip.

  “So then can I tell the girls you’ll be coming Friday night?” Kathy asked.

  “Yes, I’ll be there. But let’s keep this conversation between us, okay?”

  “Of course.”

  *

  “Okay, so now I know why acknowledgement is so important,” Mary Ellen said. “But if you’re just friends, is it really your concern how much she tells her daughter? I couldn’t imagine having to drop a bombshell like that on my boys.”

  Alice shot her a nasty look as she resumed rummaging through drawers. “Christ, I hope I live to see the day when people will stop acting like being gay is a disease or a declaration of war.”

  “Ally, it’s not even the gay thing anymore. It’s the shock of thinking you knew someone so well when all along there was this whole side they kept hidden from you. When you finally came out to me years ago, I swear, it wasn’t the fact that you’re a lesbian. It was that you’re my sister, and I thought I knew you better than anyone. Then I find out you had this whole other life you concealed from me.”

  Alice plunked down on the bed in defeat. Damn Mary Ellen and her gift of reason.

  “You know that whatever your fight is,” Mary Ellen said, rubbing her back, “I’m on your side.”

  “I know you are. Right now, I just need to disappear for a while to figure things out. Alone.”

  “You’re driving me crazy, you know that?” Mary Ellen stared at her with no trace of her usual easy-going nature.

  “Well, that unconditional sisterly support didn’t last very long.”

  “Stop running off, Alice,” she shouted. “Every time you run away from Leslie, you run away from me. Just go to her and tell her exactly what’s on your mind, for better or worse, and then put it behind you.”

  “What the hell do you mean that I’m running off? I live in Boston. I’ve lived there almost half my life. I’m just going home.”

  “It’s a move you never would’ve made if you hadn’t become involved with a woman you couldn’t have.”

  “And I also never would’ve met Maureen. Sometimes people move away, Mare, without it meaning they’re running away from something. I’m sorry I left you, all right? I’m sorry we couldn’t remain as Siamese-twin close as we were for the first half of our lives, but I had to do what was right for me. And to be honest, I have no regrets.”

  “I’m glad you don’t,” Mary Ellen said. “But before you rush home, talk to Leslie so you can keep it that way.”

  After Mary Ellen went downstairs, Alice crawled up the bed and rested her head on the pillow to consider her sister’s advice.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The next morning, after a refreshing night of sleep, Alice showered and then cowered as she crept into the kitchen. The house was mortuary quiet, Dave at work and Mary Ellen MIA, as she waited for her cup of dark roast to finish gurgling. Her little sister was not pleased with her last night, and in the golden morning sun glaring off stainless-steel appliances, Alice couldn’t blame her. Patience wasn’t her most notable trait.

  When the garage door opened, Alice plastered on an enchanting smile waiting for the side door into the kitchen to open. Mary Ellen came in with a bag of fresh bagels.

  “Good morning,” Alice sang, perky as Debbie Reynolds in Singin’ in the Rain.

  “I thought you’d be on the road by now,” Mary Ellen said. “Don’t let me keep you.”

  “Even though I deserve your unnecessary passive-aggression, I’ll only forgive you if you got me an ‘everything’ bagel.”

  “Of course I did.” Mary Ellen reached into the bag.

  “Thank you, love,” Alice said and threw a pod of coffee on for her sister.

  They started eating in silence. When Mary Ellen opened the newspaper, Alice sighed extra loudly for attention, but she clearly intended to make Alice work for it.

  “So I had my first good night’s sleep in a while,” Alice said.

  “Is that right?” Mary Ellen hadn’t even looked up.

  Alice took her time chewing a large bite of bagel and cream cheese, and then said, “What the hell, Mare,” sucking a poppy seed out of her front tooth.

  That got her to look up. “I’m sure you’ll be sleeping like a baby all the time once you’re back in your own bed.”


  “Especially when my own bed is back here in Connecticut.”

  Mary Ellen looked up again, this time beaming. “Really?”

  Alice smiled as the decision seemed to make itself.

  “Wow, I had no idea mother guilt worked on sisters, too.”

  “I was leaning toward it anyway,” Alice said. “But you weren’t exactly wrong when you accused me of running from Leslie. Old habits.” She shrugged. “Anyway, I’m going to make an appointment with a realtor friend in Boston this week.”

  Mary Ellen got up and sat in Alice’s lap, nearly choking her with a hug around the neck. “I’m so happy.”

  “Me, too,” Alice said, secretly enjoying her sister’s excitement. “But I don’t want to talk about Leslie anymore, okay? That’s not what this is about.”

  Mary Ellen sat back in her own chair and pulled an imaginary zipper across her lips.

  Alice’s cell phone chirped with a text. “Leslie.”

  “I’m not saying a word,” Mary Ellen said. “What does it say?”

  “She wants me to call her when I have a chance.”

  “Call her now. I’ll take my coffee on the patio.” Mary Ellen stood and headed for the sliders.

  “No, not right now.”

  “Why not? What if it’s important?”

  “If it was important, she would’ve called.”

  “So call her and find out.”

  “I will in a minute.” Alice’s flip-flops slapped across the kitchen floor. “I just have to…I mean I need to…”

  “This is pathetic,” Mary Ellen said. “You have such a crush on her.”

  “I know what I’ll do,” Alice said, relishing the small victories. “I’ll text her back instead of calling. That’ll keep the playing field level.”

  “Let me know when you do something,” Mary Ellen said and headed outside.

  Alice padded into the living room as she texted and watched for the three undulating dots indicating Leslie was writing back. Finally, they appeared.

  Are you still here?

  Yes, but leaving tomorrow.

  Can you come by before you go? Tonight maybe?

  Alice huffed, familiar with the old routine. She would visit Leslie that night, and the next day, she’d feel about as cheerful as she would being shipped off to war. But if Leslie wanted to see her, it must be important. What if she just wanted to clear her conscience once and for all? Alice knew not to get her hopes up. Leslie and surprise requests to get together hadn’t been such a successful combination in the past.

  May 1987

  Alice daydreamed as she packed her dishware and kitchen utensils into moving boxes. Her lease was up in a week, and she was about to embark on a new, balanced life with Maureen in her Beacon Hill cape. Now forty-three, Alice had survived a long journey full of unexpected twists and turns to arrive at a place in life where she’d finally felt at home. Maureen wasn’t Leslie, but she was devoted, loving, and passionate about the same values. Luckily, Alice had realized those were the qualities she needed in someone.

  When the phone rang, she said hello with a smile in her voice, assuming it was her partner asking how the packing was going.

  “Alice?”

  The caller’s familiar voice smudged out her smile. “Leslie?”

  “Yes, how are you?”

  “Uh, I’m fine,” she stammered as she attempted to wrap her head around the call. “How are you?”

  “I’m doing fine. I’m calling because I’m coming up to Boston Thursday and Friday with Rebecca to look at colleges.”

  “Wow, college already?”

  “Yes. It’s amazing how time flies.”

  Leslie’s tone was so chummy, she had to question for a moment whether they’d actually had a passionate love affair, or it had only been a fantasy. “It sure is,” Alice finally said.

  “And also how slowly it can seem to pass at other times.” Leslie’s softer, somber tone cleared up Alice’s momentary confusion.

  “Mmm.” Alice rested her elbows on a box on the kitchen table, too rattled by the interruption to continue packing.

  “So, since I’m coming up to your neck of the woods,” Leslie said, “I was wondering if you might like to have lunch on Friday.”

  “With you and your daughter?” Alice winced at the resentment in her voice. She’d thought those feelings were dead and buried after so many years, but like frogs in winter, they’d only lain frozen in hibernation awaiting the thaw.

  “Well, no, just me. Rebecca has an information session and then some activities at BC for prospective students on Friday.”

  Alice was silent as she processed the scenario as it developed. For the first couple of years, every ringing telephone was a psychological battering she’d had to recover from every time it wasn’t Leslie. And it never was.

  “If you can’t, I understand,” Leslie said. “I figured it might be a long shot that you’d be available anyway.”

  “Actually, I am available Friday,” Alice said without thinking.

  “Oh,” Leslie said with a note of surprise. “That’s great. Okay. Why don’t you call me with the address of a restaurant near your work, and I’ll meet you there.”

  “I have a vacation day Friday, so we can meet anywhere.”

  “Okay, fantastic. How about a little bistro around Quincy Market?”

  “I’ll come up with a place and let you know,” Alice said. “It’s good to hear from you,” she added softly.

  “I almost didn’t call. I wasn’t sure if you’d want to hear from me.”

  “You’ll always be a friend, Leslie, despite the past. I’ll always be glad to hear from you.”

  “That’s nice, Alice. I hope you know I feel the same.”

  Alice swallowed hard. A silence heavy with innuendo hung on the line. It was time to hang up. “Listen, I have to run, but I’ll call you the end of the week. Has your phone number changed?”

  “No, it’s still the same. Do you remember it?”

  Alice’s knees were knocking. “Yes, yes, I believe I do.”

  “You can always call Information if you don’t.”

  Alice hung up the phone and reminded herself it was only lunch with an old friend—an old friend around whom her sun once rose and set. But it was long over, and she was in love with Maureen. So why were her knees still knocking?

  She picked up the telephone again and dialed Maureen’s office. “Hi, Colette. Is Maureen in?”

  “Yes, she’s just come back from a meeting. I’ll put you through.”

  “Hi, honey,” Alice said when Maureen answered. Was it Alice’s imagination, or was there a twinge of guilt in her voice?

  “Hi, sweetheart,” Maureen said. “How’s the packing going?”

  “Fine. I took a little break when an old friend called. How’s your day going?”

  “Busy. Your call is a perfect excuse to take a breather. Who’s the old friend?”

  “Leslie O’Mara from Connecticut. She’s bringing her daughter up to look at colleges on Friday and wanted to meet for lunch.”

  “That sounds lovely. You should take her to Ronaldo’s in Quincy Market. The reviews are fabulous.”

  Alice closed her eyes and breathed. The conversation was getting weird. All she was doing was planning to meet Leslie for lunch, and already she felt like Reverend Dimmesdale hiding the flaming scarlet “A” branded into the flesh of his chest.

  “That’s definitely an option,” she said coolly. “Or that fantastic deli place in Faneuil Hall.”

  “Your friend is driving all the way up from Connecticut,” Maureen said. “You can’t take her for a bowl of chowder.”

  “Hey, they make a mean chowda over there.”

  “You’re a pip, honey,” Maureen said. “You take her anywhere you want. I trust you.”

  “What do you mean? Why wouldn’t you be able to trust me?”

  “I meant with your restaurant choice. You have impeccable taste when it comes to food.”

  Alice smil
ed into the receiver. “And women.”

  “A trait we have in common. I can’t wait to see you tonight.”

  “Me, too. I’ll bring the pizza?”

  “Not a chance. I’m cooking you dinner.”

  “How do you have the energy to run an ad agency and then come home and whip me up a culinary feast? Never mind. I’m just glad you do.”

  “It’s easy when you finally meet a woman you want to please as much as I do you.”

  “Call me when you’re ready to leave,” Alice said through a smile.

  She replaced the receiver in its wall cradle and resumed packing. Before meeting Maureen a year ago, she’d spent more nights than she cared to remember cursing the universe for conjuring someone like Leslie into her life. Why would the fates expose her to the most intoxicating passion and soul-crushing love she’d ever known and then make the woman responsible for it completely unattainable? It seemed like some eternal punishment Zeus would mete out to hapless mortals in Greek mythology.

  For a long time, she’d believed she would never recover or feel whole again without Leslie. But slowly, almost without awareness of it, she had. And then along came Maureen, who could be everything to her that Leslie couldn’t. If she’d thought long enough about Friday, she’d probably cancel. Or maybe Leslie would. What good could possibly come from opening old wounds and digging around inside? Still, the curiosity to see Leslie again after so many years was too strong to ignore. What harm could a little lunch do?

  *

  Mary Ellen walked into the living room, jolting Alice from her flashback. “Did you talk to her?”

  “We texted. She wants me to stop over tonight.”

  “That’s good,” Mary Ellen said, casually. “What harm could that do?”

  “I’ve decided to stop asking that question.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  As they sat at Leslie’s kitchen table having a light summer dinner, Alice was vigilant in reminding herself she was leaving in the morning and to pay no attention to how stunning Leslie looked, or to how inexplicable it was to feel so comfortable and thrilled in her presence. Their conversation flowed too easily, felt too natural for it to have been decades since they were intimately involved. Yet the fine lines on their faces proved it was true. She also braced herself for the possibility that Leslie wanted to see her merely as a “farewell, it’s been swell, but this dream’s over” kind of deal—that illusive quest for closure even as the heart fights to the death not to let go.