"I'm not... breaking anything up, am I? A couple of times I thought she was maybe, well, jealous of me."
Sarah frowned slightly. "Well, I guess she might be worried you'll change our friendship, which is probably true, but she's not a shallow person — it won't bother her for long."
"You and she never ...."
"Never." Sarah smiled indulgently. "I told you in Louisville that I'm not a casual person. Debra and I are friends. I don't sleep with my friends."
"Does that mean we're not friends?" Melissa stroked the back of Sarah's hand.
"We're lovers and very soon I hope we'll feel more like friends too. I think it takes friendship to build a successful relationship. And friendship... takes a while to build."
"I think you're right," Melissa said. "I've never stayed in one place for long enough to make friends. Friendship is harder to build than—you know, I can't think of a word to describe exactly what we are at this moment. In lust?"
"Most definitely." She raised Melissa's fingertips to her lips and nibbled.
"On the verge of friendship?"
"Probably." Sarah tickled Melissa's palm with the tip of her tongue.
"And maybe just a little bit in love?"
"Indubitably," Sarah said, trying to keep her tone light. Just thinking of saying 'I love you" made her insides freeze up with panic. But she wanted to say it. She pulled Melissa's index finger into her mouth, sucking gently on it and heard Melissa's quickly drawn-in breath.
"Sarah... how do you do that?"
"Do what?" Sarah turned her attention to Melissa's thumb.
"Make me so god-awful horny all at once?"
For an answer, Sarah pulled Melissa down on top of her and nuzzled intently through Melissa's soft chambray shirt. She found an erect nipple and took it between her teeth, making Melissa hiss.
Even though the years of office work had added some inches to Sarah's waist, she had the lasting tone of a natural athlete. Melissa was equally physical in her own way, and she began to struggle against Sarah's attempt to seduce her. They tumbled off the sofa onto the soft carpet, each looking for a hold as Sarah tried to return her attention to Melissa's breasts.
Only when she heard the tearing sound of her blouse did Sarah realize how fiercely they were straining against each other. She hesitated for a moment and Melissa took advantage of it, pushing Sarah onto her back and pulling up her bra through the torn shirt, then firmly capturing a breast in her mouth with a guttural groan.
Something exploded in Sarah and she felt the early stirrings of orgasm. Until Melissa she hadn't known her breasts were capable of providing so much pleasure. There was something else too. She realized she was taking pleasure from the rough way Melissa was kneeing her legs apart and using one free hand to unzip her slacks.
Melissa made a sound of success and pleasure as her fingertips found wetness. Sarah felt a part of her she hadn't even known was closed surge open and she urged Melissa deeply inside her.
"Is this what you want?"
"Yes," Sarah managed through clenched teeth. She rocked against Melissa for breathless minutes, who returned her mouth to Sarah's half-bared breast. "Yes —"
"Hold on," Melissa murmured.
Sarah stiffened against Melissa's thrusts, meeting strength for strength until she could take no more, and she collapsed with a weak cry.
Melissa pulled Sarah's pants all the way off and buried her mouth where Sarah so badly needed her. Sarah found herself helplessly crying even as orgasm finally swept through her.
"Darling," she heard Melissa whispering. "Don't cry. Jesus, don't cry."
Sarah struggled to control her sobbing as Melissa held her. When she could she excused herself to find a tissue and throw some cold water on her face. A few minutes later she heard Melissa come to the bathroom door.
"Are you okay?"
"Yes," Sarah said. "I don't know where that came from, but I'm pretty sure it was because I liked it."
"I wasn't too rough with you?"
"No. That wasn't it. I mean, I liked it, but that's not why I cried. I haven't felt that connected to anybody in a long time. If ever. Like you knew what I needed before I thought it."
"I'm flattered," Melissa said slowly. "But, I don't know how to say this, but the women you were with before — did they know?"
"Know what I needed? I thought they did." One of the givens in her relationship with Jane had been that Sarah unusually initiated sex, and it was Jane, the non-athlete, who spent most of the time on her back. At the time, the control Jane had given her had been erotic, but their relationship had withered when Sarah realized she no longer wanted the role. "I thought I knew. But there's never been anyone like you."
"And no one like you," Melissa said softly. "I was having a lot of encounters with politics in bed instead of good sex, you know what I mean?"
Sarah shook her head and padded out to the bedroom. Melissa followed her and together they turned back the covers on the king-sized bed.
"I'll give you an example. There was this woman, Elaine, and she and I hit it off right away and we were in bed and everything was going really well, I thought, until I flipped her over and tried to lean over her. She freaked. She said I was trying to top her and role-playing was patriarchal and I was just acting out violence against women."
Sarah felt a laugh bubble up. She was feeling giddy and lightheaded. She slipped between the sheets and made room for Melissa.
Melissa continued, her tone wry, "That's what I did — I laughed. She threw me out. Unfortunately, she then proceeded to tell everyone else at the seminar I was into sadism. And all I did was flip her on her back."
"Maybe she was a turtle in another life."
Melissa chuckled and hugged her. "You are feeling better, aren't you?"
Sarah nodded. "What other kinds of politics have you run into?"
"Oh, there was the woman who didn't want to fuck because it aped male-female eroticism, and another who thought that my attention to her breasts was based on male objectification of her body."
"I'm glad you objectify me," Sarah said.
"But there's no one like you. You seem to know what I want too."
Sarah struggled to sit upright. "You really wiped me out. I couldn't—"
"That's not what I want," Melissa said in a low tone. She reached over and turned out the lights. "I want you to hold me, and kiss me, and then I want your mouth on me ..."
The rest was lost in the featherlight kiss Sarah gave her and the soft sound of their mutual sigh.
The next six weeks were heaven for Sarah. Since Melissa's car was lucky to make it to the grocery store, three days out of five she drove Sarah to work so she could run errands or go to appointments. There wasn't a lesbian or gay community group or arts organization that she hadn't visited, met with the heads of or written to, if phone numbers weren't available.
Sarah arrived at her desk every day with the energy of ten patent attorneys and plowed through her work at a rate that raised her boss's eyebrows. She even began the map of the next application after the one she was working on and sent detailed memos to the software engineers about the timing of the specifications. She reiterated the need for unique elements to claim a patent right, as opposed to a copyright, and asked the engineers to let her know which approach would be needed for the new software. They'd told her it was "unique," but all software engineers thought their tweaked version of Tetris was unique. Only one version could get the patent. A few hours later, she got an e-mail back from the engineers telling her not to get her knickers in a twist. Typical.
Debra remained somewhat aloof, but that could have been Sarah's imagination. Debra was preparing for trial in a copyright infringement case, a process so nerve-wracking that Sarah had eschewed it forever. There were too many variables in court and the pace in a civil trial was so slow that she'd found it impossible to test the wind and sight the target.
At night she was usually home by seven, or Melissa would pick her up at the office
and they would sample yet another of Seattle's many restaurants. The weeks seemed filled with Alaskan salmon and Vietnamese fish stew and pad thai with shrimp and, of course, lovemaking that never seemed to stop, flowing from one day to the next, from a glance over dinner to a feverish encounter during morning showers.
Sarah could only hope that Melissa was as happy as she was. She assured Sarah that she was, but Sarah was beginning to realize that as hard as Melissa worked at getting to know people and sending out queries and photo sheets, the response back was slow, and without any firm promises. She could only try to understand how frustrating that must be. What Melissa was trying to do wasn't as easy as hitting a target from 77 yards with a 1/4-inch-thick arrow. The arrow flew, it hit center or it didn't, and that was the kind of instant feedback Sarah understood.
They entered the house one evening on the glow of Seattle Bonvivant curry and orange roughy and a mellow Zinfandel. Without, speaking, they bypassed the television and slid into bed with soft laughter, quickly supplanted by more fevered exchanges. As always, Sarah found herself slipping into sleep not long afterward, knowing Melissa was likely to get up to write or watch the news.
It was almost 5 a.m. when Sarah stirred and realized that Melissa was not yet in bed. She wrapped herself in her robe and went in search of her lover.
She wasn't prepared for the tear-streaked face that turned to her when she entered the dimly lit kitchen. Melissa was smoothing a letter under one hand. Other bills and junk mail lay on the table unopened. Sarah felt a chill in her stomach and she sat down next to Melissa and took the nervously fluttering hand in her own.
"Bad news?"
Melissa shook her head. "Good news. I've been thinking. And wondering what to do. I should be jumping for joy." She wiped away a tear.
"Can I read it?" Melissa handed the letter over and Sarah quickly scanned the lines. "But this is fabulous," she said. "A grant to produce your documentary... oh." She read the final sentences again. Her heart pounded with each word.
...While we understand that your scope is to eventually be national, our funds can only be used for research, filming and for the services of crafts- people and artisans all located in the San Francisco area. Your estimate for a smaller scope production based in a single city was approximately $17,000. Our grant of $22,500 should help defray your living expenses during the five to six months you will be residing in this area. If this production meets our expectations, further funding may be available for additional work in the Bay Area.
I should have known, Sarah thought. I should have known this couldn't last. Essentially, Melissa had a job offer — a good one that could catapult her to the prominence she so assiduously sought — and that meant she had to move. The house had been so full since she had arrived. And now it would be empty again. Everything would be empty again because it would take a two-hour flight plus ground time to get to Melissa, and the same amount of time to come home again. She set the letter down carefully and turned to the kitchen window.
Mt. Snoqualmie was limned with a thin line of gold, and then the first shaft of morning light beamed into the valley.
"You should go," Sarah said. "Of course you have to take it."
"I don't want to leave you," Melissa said in a low voice. "I don't know if I can."
"You have to take it," Sarah repeated. "You have to." She flipped on the coffeemaker and then found herself padding out to the garage. The icy cement bit through her slippers, but she didn't really notice. She opened the case at the end, gathered what she needed and slipped out into the backyard. She walked over the frosted grass and unzipped the tarp covering the target.
Within a few moments she had loaded her quiver, strung her competition bow and nocked her first arrow.
Shhhhhhhwoshhhh-ipppp.
It didn't even make the distance to the target. She cursed softly and nocked again.
The sound of the arrow flying was like a balm to Sarah's shattered spirits. The next five arrows found the target in the red ring, then she planted the next two neatly in the gold. Not bad for someone as badly out of practice as she was.
Grannie MacNeil had said that when two hundred Welsh archers had let fly from the foot of Eyri, the Normans had fallen back, screaming at what they thought were the wings of demons. The air beat with the passage of thousands of arrows in a few short minutes, and the archers of Wales did not miss.
Her solitary arrow flying the length of her long backyard to thump firmly into the target was an echo of finer days, when dreams sometimes came true.
She stopped when her back shrieked for a break, recovered her arrows and slipped the waterproof tarp back over the target. Her slippers were soaking and she could hardly feel her toes.
Inside, she heard the shower running and poured herself a cup of coffee. She tried to be philosophical. You couldn't trust in anything but the sunrise, Grannie had said. The sunrise and yourself. But Sarah had also learned to trust the path of the arrow. Even though she fought them, she felt tears building. The path of the arrow had not taken her to the bulls-eye once again. With Melissa she had discovered she could be the arrow, but now the target was moving.
There was only one way to keep to the path she hoped would bring her the lasting love she longed for. She hung her bathrobe on the back of the bathroom door and joined Melissa in the steamy shower. Melissa greeted her with red-rimmed eyes and exclaimed over Sarah's cold-reddened face, hands and feet.
"Whatever were you doing?" She swung Sarah under the hot spray.
"I'm going with you," Sarah said. Melissa stared at her. "I'm going with you," she repeated, and she pulled Melissa under the hot water for a kiss of promise.
Leslie
MOTION (mo'shen) [Middle English mocioun, from Old French motion, from Latin motio, motion-, from motus, past participle of movire, to move] motion (noun); motioned, motioning, motions (verb, transitive); motion (verb)
1. The act or process of changing position or place.
2. A meaningful or expressive change in the position of the body or a part of the body; a gesture.
3. The ability or power to move.
4. A prompting from within; an impulse or inclination.
4
Desire is moved with violent motion... and is called love. (Socrates)
"I want proof your homework is done or I'm pulling the plug." Leslie hovered her index finger over the main power switch and looked Matt in the eye.
"Aw, Mom," he said, not unexpectedly.
"Your report card is not what either of us expect from you. So, from now on, you show me your finished homework or no computer games. You know I can set up a password if I have to. Don't make me.
He kicked the leg of the desk, also not unexpectedly, then slunk off to his bedroom to get his books. Leslie sighed. Another eight months of the terrible twelves. Then it's the terrible thirteens for a whole year. And so on.
Matt wouldn't be slacking off on his homework if he weren't bright enough to pull in Bs without studying. But Leslie had vowed that she'd stamp out any "good enough to pass" sentiments her son might have. In the scheme of world history, this was not the time to be a lazy white boy.
"Read it aloud to me," Leslie said, when she suspected that Matt was daydreaming and turning pages to make her think he was reading. "I don't know anything about Pierce or Taylor. When I took U.S. History we jumped from war to war and in between is a vague blur."
Leslie half-listened as she finished the dinner dishes. She wiped down the counters and made a short To Do list for the morning. If she was going to have this enforced vacation, she might as well make the most of it. She heard Matt end the chapter and offered him his dessert, but he wrinkled his nose.
"Can I go outside for a while? I know it's getting dark, but I'll stay in the backyard."
"Sure. Fresh air helps the brain."
Matt gave her a look that said, "Yeah, right" and slunk out the back door. She watched his silhouette kick at imaginary rocks.
"Poor little guy," she s
aid to herself. It had been bad enough when his father had moved with Matt's two half-brothers to the East Coast. Instead of seeing his dad every other weekend, or more frequently, he saw him every other 3-week school break in the year-round school schedule.
Then his best friend's mother had gotten a promotion and they had moved to Sacramento. The two boys e-mailed each other, but Matt's evenings and weekends were essentially empty. Leslie knew how he felt — she missed Carol's coffee cake and bright wit as much as he missed Lenny's skateboarding and Nintendo.
She could always fill up the hours she'd spent yakking with Carol with work. The product launch was looking to happen in about eighteen months and she was increasingly busy. But Matt needed her more now than ever.
She tore up her To Do list. "Hey, kiddo," she called.
"Yeah," floated back out of the darkness.
"Want to go to Great America tomorrow? I promise not to scream if you go on the Drop Zone, and I'll write an excuse to the Vice Principal."
"Okay," Matt said from the doorway. "How long is Uncle Richard going to keep you from going to work?"
"Well, if everything goes well, they'll let me back in on Monday."
There was a thump from the front door and through the screen she heard Richard say, "We'll let you back in tomorrow."
Leslie flew to the door, unlocked the screen and dragged Richard into the kitchen. He had a bag full of hot bagels and what looked like real cream cheese from the deli at the bottom of the hill. Leslie let out a high-pitched squeal she hadn't known she was still capable of and threw her arms around him.
"It works!" They rocked back and forth in each other's arms, and then Matt bounded into their celebratory hug, adding his own shrill, "It works! It works!" to the noise.
Matt broke out peach Snapples for all three of them, while Leslie slathered a steaming pumpernickel bagel with cream cheese and pressed it to Richard's. "Cheers," she said. Richard was right as always: hot bread and cheese were better than champagne.
"Dammit, Leslie, I'm telling you, it worked the first time we ran it. I'm sorry you missed it." Richard had cream cheese in his mustache and beard.
Embrace in Motion Page 6