One Degree of Separation

by Karin Kallmaker

  “You don’t have to convince me.” Liddy was grinning. “The only reason my house is clean is I’ve only been there a week.” Marian didn’t want to talk about how long Liddy would be stay-ing. “I really am just lazy. Of course when school starts I’ll have an excuse.”

  “School?”

  Marian explained the value of getting a second master’s degree to make use of the first one. “It feels really good to have decided to become a professional librarian. Not that I’m not already. Sheepskin just makes it official.”

  “I hear that. What’s this?” Liddy bent over a small figure on Marian’s desk.

  “That’s the official Librarian Action Figure.” Liddy gave her a look that said she didn’t believe her. “Really. Press down and she will shush you.” Marian demonstrated.

  “Now I’ve seen everything.” Liddy let herself be shushed twice before she pointed at the wall calendar next to the window. “Are you a Harley and leather fan?”

  Marian chortled. “No, I just like to look at fellow librarians who are.”

  “You’re kidding.” Liddy peered more closely at the description.

  “With all those tattoos? Those are really librarians?”

  “Yeah. And when they shush, you listen.”

  “Okay, now I’ve really seen everything.”

  “Wait until I show you the Leather Librarian site on the Web.”

  “I can hardly wait.” Liddy turned from studying the calendar.

  “When are you going to be Ms. August?”

  “It’s not my style,” Marian protested.

  The twinkle in Liddy’s eye made Marian feel breathless and dizzy.

  “I think you’d look great.”

  Blushing, Marian led the way to the stairs.

  “This quilt is beautiful.” Liddy touched the hanging gently.

  “My mother’s work.”

  “Lovely. You like being a librarian? I considered it, but then I found out—”

  “You wouldn’t get to read books all day?” Liddy laughed. “Yeah. Something like that.”

  “Common misconception.”

  The guest room was at least tidy, albeit dusty. “You can see part of Amy and Hemma’s garden from here.” Marian raised the blinds. “I helped build that fountain and retaining wall. And the arbor.”

  “They’re the ones who are moving, right? Maybe they can put visitation rights for the fountain in the sales contract.”

  “I wish.” She was suddenly nervous. What if Liddy noticed the window opposite?

  “You have a box of ruins?”

  She turned from the window and realized Liddy was standing next to the box in the corner, reading the label. “From the vicious ex.” She paused. “I should get rid of it.” Liddy just looked at her. “I’m so sorry it happened, Marian. I’m sorry she hurt you.”

  “So am I.” Making up her mind, Marian began pulling tape off the box. “Ellie and Hemma helped me clean all this up, but I haven’t looked at it since.”

  “Are you sure you want to?”

  “I think I can.” She pulled open the flaps and slowly lifted out the cover of Francie to the Rescue. She had to swallow hard. “I had a collection of old books.”

  Liddy took the cover and turned it over. “Where’s the rest?” When Marian gestured at the box, Liddy looked inside. “Holy shit. How could someone do that? To books?”

  “She was nuts. She knew it would hurt me.” Liddy lifted out a handful of torn pages. “This was sick.”

  “I didn’t know what she was doing. It took a couple of hours.” Marian made herself breathe through the stab of remembered pain.

  “Oh. While you were—”

  “Yeah. Tied to the bed.”

  Liddy dropped the papers and threw her arms around Marian.

  “That’s so awful. I’m so sorry it happened. It makes me so angry to think of someone being cruel to you!”

  “It’s okay.” Marian held Liddy for a long moment and realized it was true. “It’s okay now. Well, not okay. But ... better.”

  “I’m sorry that yesterday I tried to compare my rotten ex to yours. That’s not appropriate, is it?” Liddy gave her a rueful look.

  “But I have to admit this is more along the lines of my crazy ex.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  Liddy hesitated. “I’ve only told my mom, and my thesis advisor had to know. It’s just—she left. No word. And took my laptop, books and research notes with her. They were in her apartment and she packed up everything and left.”

  Marian took Liddy’s hand. “There’s more, though, isn’t there?” Liddy nodded. “That was bad enough. That was actually the most work to get past. I had a backup, but I lost a lot of time redoing a lot of work. No, it gets worse with the part I can’t really fix.” Marian drew Liddy to the spare bed. “I’m not suggesting we lie down, but we can sit.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. This is more comfortable.” Liddy stretched out on the bed and patted it invitingly. Marian couldn’t move.

  “What?”

  She shook her head slightly. “You’re so beautiful. I can’t believe you trusted me that way last night.”

  Liddy reached for her hand. “I’ll never regret a minute of it, you know. Never.”

  Marian eased onto the bed, feeling nervous. But she had to smile at the twin clomp of shoes being kicked to the floor. “So, your crazy ex.”

  “Yeah, well, she walked out of her teaching job. And her reason was me. She said I’d stolen money from her and threatened her.

  That I was a stalker, basically, the crazy one. I didn’t know she’d told people that. So then I showed up at the office she shared with another prof demanding to know where she’d gone, and I was angry, and upset and not exactly pleasant about it. I didn’t know they’d been sleeping together, either. I found that out later.”

  “Oh. So the other woman believed you were the crazy one.”

  “Yeah. She believed it. And told my thesis advisor to find a way to fail me, because she’d been told I was buying my research.”

  “Oh, wow.”

  “Word got around. I could never be sure which professors knew and which didn’t. I thought everyone was talking about me.” Liddy’s sigh was deep and heartfelt. “I couldn’t do anything about that. She smeared my reputation and you don’t realize until that’s done what it meant. I knew a lot of faculty. I had switched my major a lot.”

  “But you graduated.”

  “Yes, but that’s where I got a little lucky. I finally broke down and told my thesis advisor everything. And because she knew me, she sided with me. At least, she believed that my research was my own, and the thesis was my writing.”

  Marian felt a small shiver run through Liddy’s body. “And you were able to finish?”

  “I did, and graduated. I took this job to get out of Berkeley for a while, plus it’s a great job.”

  “Do you know I have not the least idea what you’re researching?”

  “Oh.” Liddy raised up on one elbow. “You weren’t there, that’s right. You are in bed with the woman doing research for Dana Moon’s next book.”

  Marian blinked. “Wow. Is that great or what?”

  “Great.” Liddy grinned. “It’s like a dream come true. Getting paid to learn stuff and write it down. And then I met this incredibly hot librarian who has been very helpful to me. Very ... very ... good to me.”

  Liddy’s hand cupped Marian’s breast and it felt so good Marian blushed. She tried to divert the conversation while she regained her composure. “What did you want to be when you were in college?”

  “A student. I could have stayed a student all my life.” Marian chuckled. “The great Zen masters insist that we are students forever. The day you die is the day you stop learning.” Liddy turned her face to Marian’s throat to whisper, “I learned a lot about myself last night.”

  “So did I.” Liddy’s fingertips were making her nipple hard.

  Marian didn’t mind that her arousal showed.
She could make love to Liddy again, this very moment.

  Liddy’s fingers continued to tease, but her voice took on a far-away edge. “I never lost the idea that everyone was talking about me.

  About the student who had an affair with a teacher and ended up driving the teacher over the edge. I got two grades much lower than I expected and I had no way of proving it wasn’t deserved. I’ll never know if it was her or me.” Liddy nestled her head against Marian’s shoulder. “I was frantically trying to recreate work on my thesis. I had to buy a new computer and replace library books that she’d taken. Mom and Dad helped, but it was humiliating to have to ask them.”

  “Yes, I can see how that must have been hard.”

  “It happened so fast. We met on April Fool’s Day—prophetic, huh? I was practically living with her by the end of the month. And the first of May I went to her place and the key didn’t work. She was gone.”

  “And nothing triggered it? She just took off?” Liddy shrugged. “We’d had a fight about sex the night before. I was always not adventurous enough. I didn’t want it enough. At least, I didn’t want it the way she wanted me to have it.” Marian smiled gently and kissed Liddy on the forehead. “There is nothing wrong with you in bed.”

  Liddy blushed. “Well, nothing wrong with you either. She was good at that, though. Making me feel like I didn’t know shit about shit. Whenever we went anywhere, she made sure to introduce me as a student, even though I was weeks from my master’s degree.”

  “It’s insidious, all that belittling.”

  “So my key doesn’t work and no one will talk to me and my thesis is gone. And some professors I thought respected me wouldn’t look me in the eye anymore. And I was so angry. Angry at myself for falling into bed with her on the first date. Angry because even when I knew she was putting me down I stayed, because she was like some addictive drug. Mostly I was pissed as shit at Robyn, though. She stole something from me I can’t ever get back. I thought getting out of town for the summer would help me get over it. And it has.” She smiled down at Marian.

  “I’m glad.” Marian stroked the side of Liddy’s face, then gently pulled her down. Liddy’s lips were nearly on hers when Marian froze. “Wait.”

  “Mmm?” Liddy closed the distance and her lips softly met Marian’s. “What?”

  “Robyn?”

  “Yeah, the lying manipulative bitch’s name was Robyn.” Marian flushed with cold. It can’t be, she thought. The world is not that small. There had to be lots of college professors out there named Robyn. “Robyn—Vaughn?”

  Liddy sat bolt upright. “Yes. Do you know her? I’m sorry if you do—she was a bitch to me. It cost me a couple thousand dollars to replace my shit and I won’t say I’m sorry!” Liddy had been with Robyn. The thought was deeply unsettling.

  Marian had felt defiled after Robyn left her, and everything Robyn had touched she poisoned. And she’d touched Liddy.

  “I won’t listen to her being defended. It was inexcusable, what she did—”

  “She’s the one. Who killed my books.” Breakfast threatened to turn over in her stomach.

  Liddy clapped her hand to her mouth and just stared.

  “Robyn Vaughn. Visiting Professor of Women’s Studies.

  Everybody seemed to know of her or about her, but believe me, I was the only person here who knew her. Took me three months to figure out she was destroying me. You’re smarter than I am, obviously.” Liddy shook her head as the color drained out of her face.

  Marian started to laugh and once begun found she couldn’t stop.

  13

  “You’re Mary Sue. Mary Sue from Kansas City.” They sat drinking coffee at Marian’s kitchen table. Liddy had finally started to cry, which had helped Marian calm down a little.

  “What?”

  “She told me all about Mary Sue. But she said it was Kansas City. It has to be you.”

  “What did she say?” I shouldn’t care, Marian thought. It would have all been lies.

  Liddy’s laugh had no mirth in it. “You were the perfect girlfriend. The perfect lover. You let her ... play. Adventurous in bed.”

  “Oh, fuck,” Marian muttered. She wanted to throw the coffee mug against the wall, then she just felt tired. “Look where that got me.”

  “Marian, it’s okay.” Liddy touched her hand briefly. “Don’t be ashamed of that. You didn’t know you couldn’t trust her, that’s all. I met her almost two years later and maybe some of her freaked-out shit showed more. I just didn’t trust her enough yet. I thought that someday I would.”

  “Can you imagine—” Marian’s voice broke. “Ellie had to cut the damn things off me. She’d never tied them that tight. I got scared and said no.”

  “She didn’t go ahead ... after you said no?”

  “No,” Marian said quickly. She swallowed to hide a break in her voice. “But I was terrified she would come back to bed. I couldn’t have stopped her.”

  “What a psychopath,” Liddy snapped. “I got off lucky.”

  “Abuse is abuse. Don’t compare. It all does the same thing.” Marian could tell that Liddy was forcing the smile. “You have done time in therapy, haven’t you?”

  “Too much. I should have gone back for a booster shot, I think.” She rubbed her eyes. “Will I ever get her out of my life?”

  “Yes. I will, too.” Liddy refilled their coffee cups.

  “She really said I was perfect? That’s bizarre.”

  “I never thought I would ever live up to Mary Sue. Mary Sue was smart, knew what she wanted from life, worked hard, was great in bed. Actually, all of that is true.”

  “Hah.”

  “It is,” Liddy insisted.

  “So what was her reason for leaving Mary Sue the Saint?”

  “She fell in love with her next-door neighbor and broke Robyn’s heart.”

  Marian felt the color draining out of her face. Had Robyn known?

  “She used Mary Sue to put me down, and to excuse her own shit. Mary Sue broke her heart so Robyn got to drink a little too much, and take it out on me sometimes.”

  Marian remembered to exhale. Had she brought Robyn’s cruelty on herself? Had Robyn really snapped because she’d guessed Marian was in love with someone else?

  Liddy was chattering, but Marian couldn’t take any of it in. The phone rang and she went to answer it, glad of the interruption. It was Ellie, who sounded as if she’d been crying.

  Marian asked urgently, “Are you okay?”

  “No ... no, not okay.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Um, using the pay phone at Hy-Vee.”

  “Do you want me to come get you?”

  “No, I can drive. I’ll be there in a few minutes.” Dazed, Marian stood with her hand on the phone until Liddy asked, “Is something wrong?”

  “Ellie.” She turned to face Liddy and then saw that her answering machine was flashing with messages. She pressed on and listened to request after request from Ellie for her to call. “Oh, hell, she’s been trying to get me all night.”

  “Should I go?”

  “I don’t want you to,” Marian said. “But I don’t know what to expect and—”

  “I’ll go. She’s your best friend, right?” Marian nodded. “And she’s been there for me since we were in high school together.”

  “I’ll go. I need to work.” Liddy smiled nervously.

  “Can I see you tonight? Call you later?”

  The smile turned brilliant. “Yeah. It would probably help if you had my number.”

  Marian grinned and felt lightheaded. The inner voices arguing about Robyn were still at it, but she’d ignore them for now. She wrote her own number down for Liddy, and taped Liddy’s to the refrigerator. “I will call.”

  “Oh, I just remembered. I have my first official class tonight at the dojo.”

  “Then maybe I can see you after.”

  Liddy’s voice fell to a whisper. “I’d like that.” Tempted to push Liddy onto the counter and enjoy h
er body again, Marian made herself instead put her hands in her pockets.

  Robyn wasn’t going to ruin more of her life. Robyn wouldn’t prevent her from touching Liddy again. But right now Ellie needed her.

  She walked Liddy to her car and risked a kiss good-bye. Time ceased to have all meaning as Liddy’s mouth melted into hers. They were still making out when Ellie pulled up to the curb.

  “Time for me to go.” Liddy patted Marian on the chest. “If you don’t call me, I won’t forgive you. And I’ll call you to say so.” Marian was still chuckling as she waved a last good-bye. She drew a long conscious breath after that, then turned to Ellie, who had finally gotten out of her car.

  She did a double-take. Ellie’s face was streaked with tears and she was wearing the clothes she’d had on yesterday morning. “Oh, honey, what is it?” She hurried down the driveway to pull Ellie into her arms.

  “I slept in the car. I didn’t know what to do. You weren’t home. You were with her, weren’t you?”

  “Yes—is that what this is about?” She drew Ellie toward the house.

  “No, no. Not that. Sandy—Sandy’s left me. For good.” Confused, Marian said, “But ... you’d already broken up.”

  “She’s moving out. I didn’t realize what was happening. I’m such a fool!”

  They stood in the foyer while Ellie cried into Marian’s shoulder.

  She smoothed Ellie’s back and murmured comfort.

  “You know what makes it worse?” Ellie pushed Marian away and stormed into the living room. “She’s moving in with someone else!”

  “Who?”

  “You’ll never guess! Someone I thought was my friend!”

  “Oh, no—who?”

  “Terry.”

  Marian had to process this new information for a minute. “But what about Jersey?”

  “Even as we speak I think Jersey is probably asking herself the same fucking question. Apparently, Terry saw Sandy and me yesterday and thought we were getting back together. Sandy and Terry—they slept together a month ago. Terry cheated on Jersey.”