Elena Undone

by Nicole Conn

  Elena sighed. “But as the years went by, I kept wondering, what’s wrong with me? Why don’t I feel what everyone else seems to feel? Why was it all so empty? I...I tried to talk to Barry about it…I even asked him once if he wanted a divorce but by then we had moved to LA, Barry had become a pastor and we were already so involved in the church. And, then we lost...”

  Elena began to tear up, but quickly covered. “I hit a rough patch...”

  Peyton felt Elena’s sadness, saw the serious grief in her eyes and knew there was more to this. She looked away and gave Elena the space she needed to continue.

  “I don’t know...sometimes I think marriage is just a series of mutual compromises that simply become the glue...” Elena sighed again, and then looked directly at Peyton. “But I’ve never been in love with him.”

  Peyton could only hold Elena’s gaze for so long. She glanced down, then asked, “But he’s in love with you?”

  “I guess so…I don’t know,” Elena sighed. “He’s in love with the picture.”

  They both turned to look at the shimmering pool and then Elena turned back to her, stared right into her and said, “I’ve never been in love.”

  Again, Peyton found it difficult to deflect Elena’s intensity. “You’ve never been in love?”

  “No. I’m nearly forty and it’s never happened...I told Tyler I’ve come to peace with it.” They sat in silence for a moment. “Maybe some of us aren’t meant to find those soul mates Tyler believes are out there. That we’re not destined to find a soul mate this time around,” Elena summed up and then touched Peyton’s knee. “Oh my gosh…I’ve just gone on and on. Enough about me. What about you?”

  Peyton watched Elena carefully and noted her fragility at the trembling corners of her mouth.

  “Come on, Peyton…please, I didn’t mean to monopolize the conversation…it’s just been so long since I felt…” She looked at her again, direct, “safe I suppose safe is the right word—enough to share this with anyone.”

  Peyton shook her head. She didn’t want the focus shifted. “Don’t know about soul mates, but after Margaret...after that...” She tried Southern bravado. “Frankly, my dear, I never want to see another lesbian as long as I live.”

  Elena laughed and grazed Peyton’s hand, holding head., holdir fingers there for some time.

  “All I really want is a baby.” Peyton removed her hand. “To make a family...”

  Peyton picked up her wine and after some time glanced at Elena, who was looking directly at her, but with something new, a sort of revelation.

  “I feel like I’ve known you forever.”

  This time Peyton did not turn from Elena’s direct gaze.

  “I was a nun for years, with the Sisters of Charity, working at the soup kitchen...and in she comes, looking like the bad side of awful...”

  Amelia turns to Jackie. The delicate white nun, Amelia, and the solidly butch and dark African American, Jackie, are a study in absolute opposites. Amelia appears even more pale as she leans toward the dark, tattooed Jackie, who smiles now, but in contrast to Amelia’s confidence, appears timid, diffident.

  “I got Jackie into treatment, found her a welding job, and got her back on her feet…and somewhere in all of that I fell deeply in love with her.” Amelia turns to Jackie, looks at her with deep affection. “But it was against everything I believed in. I prayed, I went into seclusion but nothing, nothing could take her from my mind.”

  Amelia shakes head, and then speaks so softly she is barely audible. “And then one morning I woke, in the hospital.”

  “God, I was scared,” Jackie pipes in. “You were so pale.”

  “I had apparently passed out from dehydration. When I came to, there was Jackie. Sitting there, like an angel.”

  “The janitor at the hospital was in recovery with me. Called me and let me know Amelia was there. I never thought I would see her again...when I did I...” Jackie is overtaken with emotion. Amelia helps her regain composure.

  “In that moment, even though my entire life had been devoted to church and the Catholic scripture, I knew my God loved Jackie.” Amelia speaks with utter commitment “...And loved me loving Jackie.”

  Tyler, ensconced in his small but very professional editing bay where he cut all of the stories that he aired as his Soulemetry webisodes, edited this beautiful material together. He was astonished at the physical difference between the two women. There could be no better example of opposites attracting than these two and he found it ironic that the dark Jackie was far more shy and deferential while the pale and slender nun was defiant and confident. Well, he thought, that’s what love does. Brings out the best in everyone. As he continued his work he noted out of the corner of his eye that Elena was watching him. When he turned to her, he saw a new and gentle light in her eyes.

  Elena had been watching her sweet, wonderful friend, sitting in what he referred to as his “drabs”—jeans and his favorite old alma mater sweatshirt from the Royal Academy. He always dressed so elegantly for the public, but when he worked in production he told her, “I like to play the part. And I do adore comfort.” When he looked up at her she smiled, feeling a burst of affection for him.

  “If I didn’t know you better, I would be asking who this Greek Adonis is who’s keeping you from us morning, noon aoduning, nnd night.”

  “It’s not a guy, silly,” Elena laughed. “It’s a woman—you know Peyton—the woman I met at the adoption center? You remember—she showed up at your event.”

  “Out of thin air, presumably…” He winked.

  Elena paid little attention, running on. “She’s just so much fun, Tyler. She’s interesting, she’s got such a different perspective than anyone I’ve ever known, she’s literate, intellectual, but you know, doesn’t put on airs or anything. She makes me laugh, and oh, well, Tyler, she makes me forget all the stuff that’s so everyday, you know? I think...I think I’ve met a new best friend.”

  “Careful glam-puss—I’m your BFF.”

  “Yes, you will always be my very, very dearest friend, Tyler. It’s just with women, you know, it’s a little different and I haven’t had a good girlfriend in ages.”

  “So what am I? Chopped liver?”

  Elena knew he was teasing her. Tyler nabbed a half-filled wineglass, poured Elena one and grabbed her hand. They headed to their favorite spot in his courtyard. “Now tell me all about her.”

  As Elena filled Tyler in over the better part of a glass of Merlot, she found herself chattering nonstop, more and more giddy as she described every single thing she and Peyton had done, adding in all the little details, all the fun, the easy laughter, the things they shared in common, how Peyton was so “…she’s, I don’t know. It’s like a very strange mix of vulnerable and yet she seems so strong and self-assured. Confident, like she really knows herself, you know? She’s feminine but not like all the other women I know—”

  “Yes, she’s NOT like all the other women you know,” Tyler stated in an are you kidding me? voice.

  “I mean she’s sooo…so sensitive and smart and intellectual—”

  “Yes, you’ve said all of those things any number of times, angel!”

  Elena shook her head, “And she’s got the best taste—I love for instance the way she’s designed and decorated her house, it’s bold and interesting, with a sort of I don’t know, I just feel so comfortable there—”

  “And Martha Stewart to boot.”

  Elena shook her head at him, at which point Lily showed up.

  “Well, then…speaking of exquisite taste in women...”

  Lily, in her crisp Doris Day skirt, and black lace shirt, that strategically exposed her cleavage, walked directly up to the effete Tyler and lip-smacked him aggressively right on his lips. She asked without turning to Elena, “Are you getting my man inebriated, Elena?”

  “Maybe just a little.” “Good. I’ll take advantage of that later!”

  Elena watched Tyler unable to take his eyes off his woman and she
wistfully yearned for just such a connection. She decided to leave them, as they clearly only had eyes for one another.

  Elena got up and patted them both on the shoulders. “Don’t forget the picnic tomorrow.”

  *

  “…and the Egyptians actually kissed with noses—I suppose sort of Eskimo fashion—while the Romans kissed one another on the eyes.” Tori’s eyes were lit with enthusiasm. “Yeah, I just love doing all this research for Tyler, and he said whatever I could get him for his new Soulemetry Calendar—you know, just little trivia bits he’d use and give me like a credit for it on the back of the calendar. Me. Tori Ambrose. I’m going to have a sidebar. I might even be able to get extra credit from school for it!”

  Elena nodded without really taking in much of Tori’s rambling while Nash sat up and listened to his girlfriend, proud of her prowess.

  “Oh and get this, babe.” Tori leaned to Nash and gave him a nice long kiss. “Now that roughly burned off three calories, since in the span of a minute you lose twenty-six calories,” she motored on, “anyway—the neurotransmitters released during exercise are the same as those released during the state of kissing…so while it might take a long time to lose weight, can you think of a better exercise?”

  Nash liked this concept. “Now that’s some aerobics I can get behind.”

  As Tori pondered, a deep frown creased her forehead. “Now the flip side of this whole kissing as exercise thing is that, like, hundreds of bacteria are exchanged in a kiss—so you know...” she extended her hands in a balancing gesture, “…it’s all risk-benefit and yeah, all in the name of philematology—that’s the actual scientific term used for the study of kissing. Oh and get this, a woman has usually kissed about seventy-nine men before she finally settles and gets married.”

  “Wonder what it is for men?” Nash considered.

  “I don’t know but it better not be more than one set of lips for you!”

  As the next half hour passed, Nash, clad in his ever-present jeans and long-sleeved blue T which Tori said “brings out your eyes” and Tori, in a multicolored jumpsuit only she could pull off, belted by a tie, lounged on a blanket with a picnic basket, while Elena kept glancing around, setting things just so, then resetting them, checking over her shoulder, full of nervous energy. She too had dressed casually, enjoying wearing jeans, which she simply could not do at the church. She always had to wear what Tori referred to as “church lady couture—one half, conservative, one half drab, one hundred percent BORING!” she’d tease almost every time they headed to servitheded to ces.

  But today Elena felt alive, fresh, and she even wore a new shirt she had purchased, a rich lilac, and just as they left the house she had even unbuttoned the top two buttons so that the silk material could fall easily at her chest.

  “Wow, risqué,” Tori had quipped.

  “What’s up with her?” Nash glanced at Tori as he watched his mom wiping the picnic blanket, yet again, of invisible debris. Tori shrugged, she had no idea, but was clearly about to offer up more factoids when Peyton walked up with several shopping bags.

  “There you are. I was afraid you weren’t going to make it.” Elena jumped up the moment she saw Peyton, gave her a quick hug. Peyton was dressed casually too, or as Elena thought of Peyton’s style in her mind. Peyton dressed in masculine clothing, but it looked so much better on her than a man. It was all part of that look of confidence and a sense of strength, which looked so natural and good on Peyton.

  “Sorry I’m late.” Peyton put the sacks down and glanced at everyone.

  Elena grabbed Nash and practically lifted him to a standing position and Tori popped up as well.

  “Peyton this is my son, Nash.”

  Peyton shook his hand and then turned to Tori. “And you must be Tori.”

  Tori seemed pleased to have been part of conversation between Elena and Peyton. “And you must be the writer.”

  Peyton nodded.

  “I know everyone on the planet wants to be a writer, and God knows everyone in this town has a script they’re peddling. Not me. You know what my perfect job would be?” Tori glanced from Peyton to Elena and back to Peyton again and pronounced in exultation: “The research assistant. I’d do the meanest, deepest, most intimate statistical research on ANY topic and then I would correlate, extrapolate, assign levels of meaning to each and every—”

  “And she’d be brilliant at it,” Elena interrupted and motioned for Peyton to sit down.

  “I’ll keep you in mind for my next project,” Peyton assured her.

  “Really?” Tori was smitten. Nash was checking Peyton over, and Elena caught his grimace. Elena could tell by Nash’s face that he planned to reserve judgment about his mother’s new friend, even though she’d overheard him say to Tori, “She seems cool.”

  As the afternoon shifted to early evening, Peyton and Elena discussed different women they believed should be part of the project, each woman representing different traits they both thought were important representations of women at their best. Nash played an informal game of soccer with some other kids. Tori, her head deep into her books, would occasionally offer some germane information about the women that Peytond n that n and Elena were discussing.

  “What about firsts?” Peyton asked Elena. “You know, first woman to run for president—”

  “That would be Victoria Woodhill—who, by the way, was also the first woman to run a brokerage firm on Wall Street,” Tori proudly offered.

  Elena grinned. “It might be nice to have a section providing women’s firsts.”

  “Or Sally Ride, the first woman to go into space—can you even imagine? Or Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman doctor in America, or get this, the first person born in America was Virginia Dare—what a great name for a first! Dare…dare to be…” Tori was caught up in a delirium of facts. “Or the first woman who rode a bicycle around the world—like in the late eighteen hundreds–and she did it like in fifteen months. Can you even get over that?”

  “Now how’d she ride a bike on the ocean?” Nash asked mischievously.

  “Clearly she couldn’t pedal on water, but she did what no one else had ever done, a woman boldly journeying across the world on a bike, mind you, in a man’s world. That’s pretty incredible.”

  “It must have taken so much courage,” Elena mused.

  “Yeah, she apparently left her three kids and husband behind. According to what I could find on the Internet, there was a wager that if she could do it, she’d earn five thousand bucks, which if you equate it to today’s dollar, it would be like—well, I’d have to have my calc to figure in all the cost of living and inflationary equivalents—but suffice it to say, a LOT of money in those days. And she had never even ridden a bicycle. The sheer gumption alone!”

  “Wow.” Elena truly was impressed by this woman’s courage, leaving her family behind and merely striking out without any idea of what she might run into—what an adventurer. It was…well, it was inspiring.

  Peyton watched Elena as she eagerly learned more about Annie Londonderry—saw the light of intrigue and adventure burn in her eyes, saw a resigned wistfulness in her face that saddened Peyton a bit.

  “That was sort of her riding name.” Tori said, continuing to regale them with more facts. “She was apparently amazing at self-promotion and wrote the most fascinating recounts of her expedition…”

  Peyton felt relaxed and at ease sitting among Elena and her family, thinking that she should spend more time like this, out in the world, doing things instead of—as Wave pointed out a few weeks earlier—being endlessly “holed up like a little spider in her web, all wrapped up with no one’s company—lovely company mind you, but face it, even you have a limit.” She felt comfortable with Elena and her lovely family and it made her wonder even more about how they all worked together, what their family dynamics were like. And then she wondered what the pastor might be like and it suddenly occurred to her that no one seemed to think it odd that he wasn’t present.


  ev="0">As if Elena knew Peyton was thinking all these things, she turned to look at her and Peyton felt the pull of her look, the full impact of the exchange in Elena’s tender smile. Deep. Sweet.

  Tyler came up from behind and whooshed the startled Elena up into his arms.

  “Told you we’d make it! Miss Thang here just had to do some last-minute contracts, but better late than never.”

  Lily, clad in park-wear Prada, shook Peyton’s hand, claiming to remember her from Tyler’s Soulemetry event, and then plopped herself beside Tori and pulled out her traveling chess game. Tori was thrilled. “Set ’em up. You’re goin’ down this time!”

  As the sun began to fall, Tyler opened a bottle of wine, poured glasses for the grownups and allowed Nash a little sip, to which Elena shook her head, but allowed, “Just one.” And then Elena’s son, lying next to his mom, took out his DES game and began to play while Lily and Tori were deeply engaged in their chess game and verbal sparring.

  “Did you know that chess is the only board game that the International Olympic Committee recognizes as a mind sport?” Tori mused.

  “What I know,” Lily thought carefully before she moved her next piece, “is that chess is the one game that prepares you for the boardroom, disciplines takeover strategies and keeps you razor sharp.”

  “Ahhh, I love when you get poetic, darling,” Tyler teased, and then continued to regale Peyton with Elena’s past: “Yeah, she’d walk through the halls and the seas would split. People were mesmerized by her very presence and all the guys, well they would be silly fools, trying to be clever, dashing, intellectual— whatever they thought might appeal to her.”

  “Tyler, you’re exaggerating!” Elena interjected.

  “Hardly, my dear, you have to admit you caused quite a stir with your stunning exoticness, that inspiring accent and then, of course, Elena doesn’t seem to have any idea how incredibly gorgeous she is—”